


Sons of Sirens

by sophene



Category: Batman (Comics), Young Justice (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dick Grayson is Stray, Jason Todd is Jack of Clubs, Multi, Rated for Jason's Language, Tim Drake is Nightshade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-10
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2019-09-15 17:20:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 111,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16937496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sophene/pseuds/sophene
Summary: Bruce Wayne wasn't at the circus the night Dick Grayson's parents died, and his boys were adopted by the Gotham City Sirens instead.





	1. Chapter One

The temperature was below freezing that night in Gotham. Damian was patrolling with his father in Crime Alley, but if there was trouble happening, it was happening indoors, out of sight. The only thing they’d done so far was break up a fight between a couple of drunks and drop off a stray dog at a 24-hour emergency vet.

Damian had become unguarded after hours of freezing and doing nothing, so he couldn’t help the flinch when Oracle suddenly said, “ _Batman_?” She hadn’t contacted either of them that night until then, and he still wasn’t quite used to having her in his ear all of the time.

“What is it, Oracle?” Batman asked.

_“Several civilians on Twitter say they spotted the Sirens hitting up the Bergduff’s in the Diamond District. The police haven’t been alerted_.”

“Have you confirmed it?” Batman asked.

“ _Not yet, but I’m working on pulling the camera footage from nearby_ ,” she said.

“Good. There’s nothing happening here, so Rook and I will head that way. Let me know what you find out,” he said.

“ _Will do_.”

His father signaled at him to return to the car and Damian followed him to it.

As Damian was strapping himself into the passenger seat, his father said, “Do not engage. Distract and frustrate them. Restrain them if you can. If one of them tries to fight you, you will retreat to the cave. Do you understand?”

Damian rolled his eyes and said, “Yes, Batman.” He hadn’t fought the Sirens yet since officially becoming becoming his father’s partner, but every time Damian was about to fight another of his father’s major villains, it was the same. He was allowed to annoy the villain, throw smoke bombs at them, tie them up if there was no risk to his safety, but he wasn’t allowed to actually fight. It was a gross waste of his abilities.

They were almost to the Diamond District when Oracle said, “ _Got the footage_. _It’s not the Sirens. It’s the boys_ ,” Oracle said.

“All three of them?” Batman asked.

“ _Just Stray and Jack of Clubs so far. No sign of Nightshade._ ”

“We’re almost there,” Batman said.

“ _I’ll clear the streets_ ,” Oracle said.

There wasn’t enough time for his father to give anymore instructions. They left the car in an alley a couple of blocks away from the department store and got out their grappling guns to swing the rest of the way there.

Damian inspected the store as they approached. From the outside, nothing seemed to be amiss. It was nearly 3 a.m., so the store was closed, the lights all off except for some emergency lights. Traffic was light at that late hour, and there were only a few civilians down on the sidewalk.

Damian landed beside his father on the roof.

“No indication of a break in,” Damian commented.

“I can see that, Rook.”

Damian shot an irritated look at the back of his father’s head.

“You go in up here and make your way down. Stay out of sight. Let me know what you see,” Batman said.

Then his father jumped over the side of the building and was gone.

Damian sniffed contemptuously, but did what his father said.

It was easy to get in through the roof. This building was old, pre-1940s if Damian was guessing correctly, and had that odd blend of Gotham gothic and art deco architecture that was unique to this city and this city alone. The roof door was rusting and had a faulty alarm. He made his way undetected through the dark upper level of the building, which was just a bunch of small offices with low ceilings. He didn’t find anything amiss up there, so he made his way down.

Damian wandered the building for a while before he found anything interesting. The restaurant was empty, as was the furnishings level. If the building had any alarms, they had been disabled. There were still no police officers. Whoever was in the building had done a pretty good job remaining undetected.

He didn’t run into trouble until he reached the menswear department. The scents of clean fabric and leather were sharp in his nostrils. Damian slid silently through the racks of clothes, shoes, the watch counter, tables of accessories. Pennyworth wouldn’t be caught dead shopping in this establishment, Damian thought, wrinkling his nose at a mannequin wearing a tacky beige sweater vest.

He didn’t see or hear anything. It was an enormous disappointment. He lifted his arm to update his father about his lack of findings when a soft chuckle made Damian’s skin break out in goosebumps. He was grateful his suit covered him from head to toe.

“Hey, kitten.”

Damian whirled in the direction where the voice had come from, but didn’t see anyone.

“Where are you?” Damian demanded.

There was a soft _whoosh_ sound, and then a dark shadow dropped onto the ground next to the cologne counter behind him. Damian saw the shadow in his peripheral vision and whirled.

“It’s nice to see you,” Stray said. He put his hands on his hips and smiled down at Damian, as if they were two old friends running into each other in the middle of errands.

Damian didn’t return the sentiment, and instead looked at the stuffed leather bag attached to Stray’s hip. His coiled whip was attached to his other side.

“Where’s the big bat?” Stray asked. “He is here, I assume. Doesn’t he keep you on a pretty short leash?”

Damian bristled and said, “He is here.”

“Rats. What gave us away? Did I trip an alarm somewhere? I was so careful,” Stray said.

He leaned against the cologne counter. The tips of cat ears barely peaked over the top of his fluffy black hair, and the neck of his skin-tight costume was unzipped all the way down past his pectoral muscles. Damian didn’t understand why Catwoman and Stray always had to be so _indecent_.

But Damian resisted the temptation to tell Stray to zip his suit up, and instead said, “Social media. You and Jack of Clubs were spotted by a couple of civilians and they posted about it on Twitter.”

“Damn. The internet makes good crime so much harder,” said Stray.

He pushed away from the cologne counter suddenly and strolled in Damian’s direction. He stopped when Damian pulled out a throwing star and brandished it at him. As weapons went, the shuriken had never been Damian’s favorite, but since he hadn’t yet figured out where his father had buried his katana, he had to make do with what he had.

“Do not approach me!” Damian told him.

Stray tutted at him and said, “Chill, kid. I’m not going to hurt you. I don’t think you’re going to hurt me, either. I heard a rumor your daddy doesn’t let you fight the bad guys.”

Damian balled his free hand into a fist and glowered up at Stray.

But then a glorious thought occurred to him. In the car his father had told him not to fight the Sirens, but the Sirens weren’t here, and their sons were a different matter. Stray wasn’t a supervillain, he was just a kid—older than Damian, sure, but not very much older than Brown or Cassandra. His father hadn’t said anything about Damian not fighting one of the bad guys’ junior partners.

Damian had to suppress a grin.

“I like the new digs,” Stray said, gesturing up and down at Damian’s black suit with a hand. “What is it that people are calling you now?”

“Rook.”

“Rook,” Stray said slowly, like he was trying out the word in his mouth. “So goth. I guess that is the bat brand. I think I like Batboy better, though. You should have stuck with that name.”

“I was never _Batboy_ ,” Damian snarled.

Stray smiled at him.

“Jack of Clubs is here. What about the plant?” Damian asked.

“Nightshade?” Stray said, and shrugged. “I don’t know, maybe he’s here. He can be kind of a loner, so maybe he decided to stay home.”

“You should leave before my father catches you. Unlike the others, you have never been caught before, isn’t that correct?”

“Oh, I’ve been caught before, baby bat. It’s just so hard to hang onto me.”

Damian gave him a down and up look, from his feet to the top of his head, and said, “You appear to be over the age of eighteen to me. I am sure that being caught and arrested would be most unfortunate for you.”

“Are you concerned about me?” Stray asked. He pressed a hand to his chest and said, “That’s so sweet.”

Without warning, Damian lunged for him.

Stray had good reflexes, Damian would admit that. The man twisted in a way that was distinctly catlike and flipped up onto the cologne counter. His landing was so gentle that he didn’t even crack the glass.

Damian had guessed that the man would be quick enough to get away from him, however, and threw the shuriken right at his stomach. Stray darted out of the way, but he wasn’t quick enough. Damian heard the man’s grunt of pain as the weapon sliced his side. The heavy bag attached to his hip slipped down his leg and bounced off the counter. When it hit the marble floor, the flap burst open and its contents spilled out.

Damian inspected the scattered pile of bills and jewelry.

Stray pressed a gloved hand to his side and hissed. There was a thin cut in his suit, revealing bloody skin beneath. Stray looked at the blood on his fingers and then down at the broken bag.

“That was naughty,” Stray said, frowning. His obnoxious teasing mood was all gone.

Damian shrugged.

Stray straightened and detached his whip from his other side.

“ _Rook, what are you doing_?” Oracle asked.

This time Damian didn’t flinch when she spoke, but he didn’t answer her either.

As Stray hopped back off the cologne counter, Damian pulled one of the bombs out of his utility belt and threw it at the ground, filling the area with dusty smoke. Because of the emergency light over the cologne counter, Stray had the disadvantage. Damian could see his shadow, but Stray would not be able to see him.

“I don’t want to fight you,” Stray said.

“I do not find that surprising, considering that I beat you the last time,” Damian said.

“You got lucky. Caught me off guard.”

Rook was going to retort, but Oracle said, “ _Rook, stop! Batman told you not to fight!_ ”

Damian, again, ignored her. He didn’t care how long the woman had worked with his father—he had been training to fight since before he could remember. He had grown up with the League of Assassins. He was Batman’s heir. He could handle a low-life like _Stray_.

Stray snapped his whip, close enough that Damian could feel it upset the air, but he didn’t flinch.

Enough dancing around it, Damian decided. Without a word, he ran at Stray, using a display table to launch himself up into the air and aim a kick at Stray’s chest. Damian’s boot landed on Stray’s chest with a satisfying _thud_ , knocking the man off his feet. Stray grunted as they toppled toward the ground.

It didn’t take Stray long to recover. It had been a long time since Damian had fought him, and he forgotten how Stray’s bones seemed to be elastic. In an instant Stray was rolling over, tossing Damian off as he flipped over his head. Damian had hardly hit the ground before Stray was up and running. But the man wasn’t trying to get away. As Damian got back to his feet, Stray snapped out his whip, which tightened around Damian’s ankles. Stray yanked him off balance again and Damian fell.

Oracle was screaming in Damian’s ear. He heard bits and pieces of what she was saying—something about Batman and Jack of Clubs and more demands that Damian stop, but Damian was too focused on the fight now to pay her any mind.

“I still don’t want to fight you,” Stray told him.

Damian got out another shuriken to cut the whip away, but Stray pulled on it. Damian flipped as the whip released his ankles, and the second he was free, he threw the shuriken. Stray dodged it, of course, and Damian got to his feet and charged at Stray.

He aimed a kick at Stray’s chest, which Stray dodged. Stray cracked the whip and tugged, and suddenly a tall glass display case was toppling over. Damian flipped backwards just before it crushed him, and it shattered on the floor instead, scattering bits of glass all over the marble.

Damian rushed him again.

He punched, but it didn’t land. He kicked, and Stray slid out of the way. The man hadn’t been lying—he was slippery. Damian managed to swipe him a couple of times, but Stray was too fast, and Damian wasn’t able to land another hit.

Damian let out a mindless roar of rage and yelled, “Fight me, coward!”

Stray’s mouth tugged into a grin, but suddenly there was a crunch overhead, like rock cracking.

Damian and Stray looked up as a dark mass of vines came bursting through the ceiling right over them. They had to split in opposite directions as plaster, wood, and marble began to plummet down. As he was getting away, a chunk of something hit Damian on the back of the leg and sent him sliding across the slick floor.

Damian coughed on the dust and pushed himself up as the vines carried someone down through the new crack in the ceiling.

Nightshade.

Damian hadn’t seen the boy for over a year, but he didn’t look like he had changed much. He was much thinner and shorter than Stray, and most of his green-tinged skin was bare. His dark eyes took in Stray and Damian, and he did not seem to be surprised at all to see either of them. Even as he settled on the ground, his vines kept creeping through, spreading out over the cracked ceiling and down the scattered pillars onto the floor.

In his earpiece, Damian heard Oracle swear.

“What a mess,” Stray said, crossing his arms over his chest as he took in the destruction. “This isn’t the way I wanted this night to go at all.”

Nightshade sighed and said, “I know. How tragic.”

“ _I’m calling the girls_ ,” Oracle said. “ _Don’t let him touch you_.”

“I know,” Damian hissed, but Oracle didn’t say anything else.

Damian got to his feet. The back of his leg throbbed from where he’d been hit, but the blow hadn’t punctured his suit.

Nightshade saw him getting up and said, “Oh, it’s you.”

As much as Damian hated to admit it—even to himself—this was not ideal. Of course, Damian could easily take either of the boys if they were alone. But Stray had been a protégé of Catwoman for almost a decade, and Nightshade, though not as powerful as Poison Ivy, was still a meta. That didn’t mean that he was going to back down from a fight, should it come to that, however. He was sure he could beat both boys, so long as he had a plan.

“I didn’t recognize you in that ridiculous outfit,” Nightshade said, eyeing Damian up and down.

Damian sneered at him and said, “You’re one to talk.” Nightshade’s “suit” was just a pair of wine-colored pants that had green designs of twisted vines and leaves around his waist and above his knees. He wasn’t even wearing anything on his feet.

“Where’s Jay?” Stray asked Nightshade.

“Downstairs fighting Batman, last time I saw him,” Nightshade said.

Stray frowned and said, “This got out of control fast. We should get out of here before it gets any worse.”

“I think it’s going to be difficult to convince Jay to walk away from his fight,” Nightshade said.

Stray swore under his breath. While they were distracted by their conversation, Damian slowly reached for his utility belt.

“I don’t think so,” Nightshade said, and a vine shot out and grabbed onto Damian’s arm. He tried to pull it off, but another vine shot out of another shadowy corner of the sales floor and grabbed his other arm. When Nightshade brushed a hand along the vine nearest to him, tiny thorns popped out of the skin of the vines holding onto Damian, and a few of the thorns were actually strong enough to prickle through his suit. Damian gasped and thrashed at the pain, but the vines jerked and began to pull his arms in opposite directions. Damian grunted.

“N,” Stray warned.

“What?” Nightshade said.

“He’s just a kid.”

“I don’t care.”

Damian thrashed harder, but it was just a ruse to make Stray and Nightshade believe that they had him bound. All he had to do was tap his thumb and his middle finger together—which is what he did—and thin blades popped out between the fins on his gauntlets, snapping the vines. Nightshade let out an inhuman keen as the vines that had held Damian shied away from him.

“That hurt, you little brat!” Nightshade yelled.

A shudder went through the mass of vines still spreading throughout the level. At once, they all shifted and began to move in Damian’s direction. He had to dodge as one snapped out at his head.

Stray said, “N, don’t—”

But then there was a _boom_ and the building shuddered. Whatever it was, it had come from below. Stray and Nightshade stopped and looked at each other.

Damian decided to take the opportunity that the distraction had provided, and ran.

Of course, he wasn’t _running away_. Damian did not run away from fights. It was simply obvious that there was something going on downstairs, and his father could need assistance.

Damian dodged tables and racks and when he reached the escalators, he didn’t even bother to look down—he jumped over the railing and began to fall. Before he hit the ground, he pulled out his grappling gun, pressed the trigger, and swung to a stop on the lowest level.

His feet were only on solid ground for a second before something gigantic was hurtling at him.

“Move!” Batman yelled, and Damian twisted out of the way before the thing could hit him. It flew past him and collided with a row of mannequins instead.

The gigantic _thing_ turned out to be Jack of Clubs. The man—boy, really, but he was already taller than most men—climbed to his feet and disentangled from the destroyed mannequins. The image of the Jack figure from the playing card was painted a stark white over the chest of his black suit, and the symbol was oddly bright in the dark store.

Batman yelled, “Rook, get out of here!” but Damian was too distracted by Jack of Clubs to obey the order. The boy had noticed Damian and was chuckling as he approached, looming over him like a giant. The white mask that covered the bottom of his face was a voice modulator, and turned his laugh into a mechanical rumble. He was dragging his spiked club behind him, letting it scrape across the marble and leaving a trail of blood behind. That had to be Batman’s blood, Damian realized.

“Long time no see, bat brat,” Jack of Clubs said.

Damian stared up at him, and if his mouth was a little dry, Damian would never admit it. There were tactics for large opponents. He could beat Jack of Clubs. He refused to be cowed by some Joker sidekick reject.

Then two things happened at once. Vines burst through the railing overhead and Nightshade hung on as they carried him down to the ground level. Then something collided with Damian, knocking the breath of his chest and hauling him up into the air. Damian looked down at the leather-clad arm holding onto him. Stray.

Together Damian and Stray swung back up passed the second floor and over the railing onto the third level.

“Release me!” Damian said, reaching for the railing, but Stray backed away from it and held onto him tighter.

Down below, Nightshade and Jack of Clubs had Batman cornered. Jack of Clubs cackled and lifted up his club with both hands, and Nightshade was standing on a platform of swirling, thorny vines that seemed to be growing larger by the second.

Damian struggled in Stray’s grasp, but Stray didn’t let him go.

“I have to help him,” Damian said.

“Trust me, you don’t want to get in the middle of this,” Stray told him.

Nightshade and Jack of Clubs advanced on Damian’s father. Jack of Clubs laughed and ran at Batman first, lifting the club over his head. Nightshade slashed out with his vines and made a grab for Batman’s legs, but Batman pulled something from his utility belt and tossed it at them. A cloud of white exploded over a section of the vines and the white dust grew into a patch of hardening ice. Batman got out of the way just in time for Jack of Clubs to bring his club down upon the frozen patch of vines, and shards splintered through the air.

Nightshade shuddered and snapped, “Jay!”

“Whoops,” said Jack of Clubs as he struggled to wrench his club out of the dead vines.

Batman muttered something that Damian was too far away to hear. Damian was unsurprised when, a second later, he heard Oracle’s voice saying, “ _Rook, where are you?_ ”

“Third level,” Damian said, and felt Stray tense.

Downstairs, Jack ran toward Batman again.

“ _What’s happening?_ ” Oracle asked. “ _Jack of Clubs broke Batman’s camera and you’re too far away for me to be able to see anything._ ”

“Nightshade and Jack of Clubs are fighting Batman,” he said. He craned his neck for a better look over the railing, trying to give her a better view. Down below, Batman kicked Jack of Clubs in the stomach and knocked him down. Some of Nightshades vines were creeping up over the counters and were pelting Batman with a barrage of watches, plastic makeup containers, bottles of perfume, and whatever else they could reach. Jack of Clubs was still laughing when he got to his feet, but instead of aiming for batman, he swung the club at a shelf of leather goods and sent it crashing toward Batman. Damian didn’t know if his father was aware of the wriggling tumor of vines behind the broken mannequins, and he was too busy dodging the tossed debris, Jack of Clubs, and all the tinier vines that were snatching at him to be able to focus on attacking either boy. The air reeked of mixed perfumes, the smoke bombs, and the heady scents of dirt and plant growth. It was pure chaos.

“ _The girls are on their way. Should be about five minutes,_ ” Oracle said.

“Understood,” Damian said, and she was quiet.

“Something tells me this store is about to get very crowded,” Stray said casually.

Downstairs, the wriggling tumor of vines behind the broken mannequins shuddered ominously and burst open. A huge dark bud rose out of the center, and its stem twisted toward Batman.

“Father, look out!” Damian yelled, just as the flower’s barbed petals bloomed. A shower of something purple and foamy spit out of it, and Batman barely raised his cape in time to block the stream. Damian breathed a sigh of relief, but his relief was short-lived. A smell like burning plastic overpowered even the smell of all of the mixed perfumes spilled on the ground, and Batman’s cape started _melting_.

Damian’s father was detaching the cape when Stray put two fingers in his mouth and whistled sharply. Batman, Nightshade, and Jack of Clubs looked up toward the sound.

“The future is female, boys. Time to go home.” Stray looked down at Damian and said, “Sorry about this, birdy. Hey Batman! Catch!”

Before Damian could react, Stray pulled Damian’s grappling gun off his belt and threw Damian over the railing.

Damian was too surprised even to cry out. For a moment it was as if he was trapped in mid-air, looking down at Batman. His father’s face was tilted up toward him, his mouth open in an expression of shock.

Then the bone white ground was rushing up at him, and his father’s dark shape was moving. Damian slammed into his father’s body instead of the marble. Batman was knocked back, Damian clutched tightly in his arms.

The distraction achieved what it had been intended to achieve. When Batman sat up, still holding Damian—and no, Damian was not _shaking—_ Nightshade, Jack of Clubs, and Stray were gone.

“Oracle,” Batman said.

“ _Yes Batman?_ ” she asked. Her voice sounded a little breathless.

“The boys are gone. Tell the girls to search the area instead. And call Gordon.”

“ _Yes sir_ ,” she said.

They couldn’t linger. Batman was bleeding from a messy shoulder wound that Damian had been too far away to see before, and there was still acidic residue on his suit. More immediate even than that, however, was that they needed to get up and go after Stray, Jack of Clubs, and Nightshade. The Sirens’ sons needed to pay for all of the destruction they had caused that night, for the destroyed department store, for his father’s wounds. Damian knew this.

But for some reason Batman didn’t move, and instead kneeled on the ground until the police showed up. His arms were locked around Damian like a vice. 

* * *

The sun was rising by the time Damian and his father were finally making their way back to the cave. Father didn’t say anything the whole way there, so Damian sat in the passenger seat with his arms crossed over his chest, his mouth gritted shut in a flat line.

The girls had been instructed to meet them back at the Manor, so Damian wasn’t surprised to see Black Bat, Spoiler, and Batgirl standing around the computer with Pennyworth when they arrived. Oracle’s image was up on the screen, and the girls were talking to her as they emptied the tray of sandwiches Pennyworth was holding.

Father got out of the car and walked up to meet the others without looking back at Damian. Damian got out and followed, watching as his father pulled his cowl off and held it clutched around his bleeding shoulder. As Batman approached and pushed past Pennyworth and the girls to get to the computer, they all fell into a hushed silence.

Naturally, it was Brown who had to speak. She raised an eyebrow and whistled as she examined the state of Damian and his father.

“Holy shit. Babs, you weren’t kidding. The Sirens’ sons did this to you two?”

“Quiet,” Father said.

Behind his back, Brown rolled her eyes and mouthed _quiet_.

“Sir, it appears you require immediate medical attention. And what in heaven’s name happened to your cape?” Pennyworth asked.

“What’s left of it is in the car,” Father told him.

Up on the screen, Oracle’s face was tense with worry. Father said, “Computer, disconnect feed,” and her window disappeared.

They all watched as Batman pulled up the files he kept for Nightshade, Stray, and Jack of Clubs. Next to their aliases and photos—mug shots for Jack of Clubs and Nightshade, a grainy screenshot from a surveillance camera for Stray—were their threat levels in black. All three were currently marked as intermediate.

“Upgrade open files,” Batman said.

Damian tensed.

“Threat level: High,” Batman said.

On the screen the words changed, and the letters turned from black to red.

This task accomplished, Batman turned away from the computer and pushed back through the crowd.

A sick feeling coiled in Damian’s stomach when his father came to stop in front of him. Batman waited for Damian to look up, but Damian glared at a dark corner of the cave instead.

“Look at me, Rook,” his father said.

Damian glared up at him. His father’s lined and dirty face was stony with disapproval.

“Tonight you will put your suit up and write your report. Tomorrow night we will discuss what happened. Do you understand?” his father asked.

“Yes,” Damian said.

Father left for the medical bay without another word.

The girls were all still standing there gawking even after he was gone. Damian didn’t have to look at them to know, and his chest flared with anger. They had no right to spectate during his humiliation.

Pennyworth coughed pointedly.

“Girls, I think it is time for all of you to put your equipment away and head to bed. It is quite late, and some of you have school in a couple of hours. I am speaking to you in particular, Miss Row,” Pennyworth said severely.

Harper Row sighed, and Brown whispered something to Cassandra that Damian couldn’t hear. They did all turn and go, however, which Damian appreciated. Sometimes Pennyworth was good for something.

When they were gone, Pennyworth brought the tray over and said, “Sandwich, Master Damian?” He pointed at something on the tray, but Damian didn’t look. “These two are vegetarian. I made the girls save them for you.”

“I’m not hungry,” Damian said.

“Well, if you should get hungry later, I shall wrap them up and put them into the refrigerator for you,” he said.

Damian looked up at the computer screen and stared at it until Pennyworth sighed and left to go help his father with his wound.

Up on the screen, those red letters taunted him. The girls were talking as they put their suits and equipment away. They were too far away for him to hear what they were saying, but he had no doubt they were discussing his failures. That was surely what they had been discussing with Oracle before Damian and his father returned to the cave.

“Computer, close files,” Damian said. Up on the screen, the files disappeared.

Damian pulled off one of his gauntlets. There was a green thorn stuck in the Kevlar, just over the wrist. Damian pulled the thorn out and crushed it beneath two fingers.

He began to peel off the rest of his Rook suit right there by the computer. He found all the rips and tears from the night as it came off piece by piece, and hated the Sirens’ sons more and more for every scratch in his armor.

He left the pieces of it on the ground for Pennyworth to mend and put away, and headed upstairs to write his report.


	2. Chapter Two

Dick really, really wanted to keep the grappling gun. It was a beautiful piece of equipment—shiny, smooth, and as heavy as a handgun, but at the same time nothing like a gun at all. It would no doubt be so much more useful for getting around Gotham than his whip, and he felt the same kind of rush holding it as he did when he held a diamond necklace or priceless work of art.

He couldn’t keep it, of course. Everyone knew that Batman always came back for his tech. Still, Dick wasted ten minutes or so standing on a rooftop pretending to fire it at various buildings. Then he stashed it in the trunk of a random taxi and went looking for Tim and Jason.

Over the few years Dick had known them he had developed a kind of sixth sense when it came to Tim and Jason. He thought about all of the various places around the city where they could be hiding and made an educated guess that they would be at one spot in particular: the basement of a vacant Wayne Enterprises building over in Midtown. He got out his whip and headed that way.

The building, like all of the boys’ hideouts, was protected by a network of alarms that Dick and Tim set up. The ground floor was dark and empty, but the boys knew how to keep out of sight. Dick let himself in and reset the alarms before he climbed down the elevator shaft to the basement level. Halfway down, he heard the tell-tale sounds of Jason and Tim bickering and silently congratulated himself for guessing correctly.

“—I am not installing speakers here. That’s not the point of this place. I found it so I could turn it into a lab.”

“If it’s a place where we’re going to be hiding out then it needs to have some normal stuff like our other hideouts,” Jay said.

“Again, this is not a hideout—”

“Well it’s one now, and if I’m going to have to stay here then I want—”

“You were never invited to stay here! You just followed me here!”

“This is the newest place and therefore the least likely to be known by the Bat. You don’t own the building, you can’t claim it.”

Dick walked around a pile of cubicle parts and other junk left behind by the building’s past occupants and saw Tim and Jason on the concrete floor under a sunlamp. Jason’s mask, weapon, and the top half of his Jack of Clubs suit were abandoned on concrete, and he was stretched out on his bare stomach with his shirt rolled up while Tim stitched up a cut on his back. Tim was still only wearing the Nightshade pants. It was frigid in the basement, and while Dick knew that Tim wasn’t affected by the cold as much as a normal person, he shivered just looking at him anyway.

“It’s a place that I found! We wouldn’t have it at all if not—”

Dick walked into the circle of light under the sun lamp. Tim abruptly stopped talking when he appeared, but when he saw it was just Dick his alarm immediately faded into boredom.

“Oh, it’s you,” Tim said. He turned his attention back to Jason’s cut, and the bit of skin pinched between his fingers.

Jason pushed himself up and looked at Dick over his shoulder while Dick pulled off his goggles.

“What are you doing here, dickhead?” Jason asked.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Are you upset that I followed you?” Dick asked.

Tim sighed. Jason cackled.

Jason settled the side of his face back onto the ground and Dick watched Tim pull the needle through Jason’s skin. Jason screwed up his face, but didn’t complain. His back was already littered with scars, some older and faint, some pink and new.

“I can tell a lecture is coming, so you might as well get it over with,” Tim said.

The kid was very smart.

“When I said that I was going out on a job, that was not an invitation to come with me,” Dick said.

He crossed his arms over his chest and waited, but neither of the other boys said anything—no excuses, no explanations, nothing.

“Well? Why all of this interest in togetherness all of the sudden?” Dick finally asked.

Tim cocked one eyebrow and said, “Don’t look at me. Jason was the one who went after you. I only went after him because I knew he was going to do something dumb.”

“Hey, fuck you,” Jason said.

“Something dumb like busting a hole through the floor of a department store?” Dick asked.

Tim shrugged and said, “It’s the Diamond District. They can afford to rebuild.” He added a muttered, “Unfortunately.”

“And you,” Dick said, glaring down at Jason. “You’ve done a lot of dumb things, but picking a fight with Batman is by far the dumbest idea you’ve had all year.”

Jason smiled and asked, “As dumb as tossing the Bat’s kid off a ledge?”

Dick felt a twinge of something like shame. It was an uncomfortable feeling, one he didn’t experience often.

“I knew Batman could catch him,” Dick said.

Jason snickered, and Tim said, “Sure,” in a way that Dick knew meant he didn’t believe him.

“Neither of you were getting out of there unless I did something,” Dick said.

“We were handling it,” Tim said.

“Yeah, we were kicking his ass,” Jason said.

Dick closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Stray had a reputation for being an easygoing, uncomplicated individual, the kind of person who never worried about anything. But Dick Grayson sometimes felt like he’d ended up the harassed responsible older brother of the world’s two biggest idiots, and he didn’t know how that happened.

“What?” Tim asked, frowning. “We were beating him.”

“Ok boys. If fighting Batman is something the two of you are planning on doing more often, then take some advice from somebody who has had his ass kicked by him more than once.”

“Oh, yes, please, we are dying for your wisdom, Dickory,” Jason said.

Dick ignored him and said, “You may think you’re winning, but odds are the Bat just wants you to _think_ that you are. And even if you do manage get the upper hand, you aren’t going to keep it for long.”

Tim and Jason frowned, but didn’t argue. He could tell they were both replaying the night’s events in their minds, wondering how Batman could have gotten the upper hand.

“He couldn’t handle all of us fighting together,” Tim finally said. “Individually, sure, and maybe me and Jason even without you. But all of us together is different. That’s the way the Sirens have beat him before—”

“I have no intention of forming some kind of anti-Batman fight club with you two,” Dick said. “All I wanted to do was get in there, steal a little cash, and get out. But you two had to come along and trash the place. The Sirens are on thin ice with him right now, you know. Did it occur to either of you at any point that what you were doing might be mucking things up for them?”

Tim looked uneasily up at Dick at the mention of the Sirens. A little too casually, he asked, “Do you think they’re going to be mad?”

Dick knew Tim meant Ivy in particular. Sometimes it was easy to forget how young Tim was. He was a genius, and he acted so mature for his age, but he was also more than a little desperate for Ivy’s acceptance. He tried to hide it behind a wall of flat indifference, but Dick had always been able to tell how badly he wanted her to approve of him.

Jason snorted and said, “Not Harley. She’s always down for a brawl with the Bat.”

“More disappointed than mad, if I had to guess,” Dick said.

Tim frowned, but did not look reassured. Which was, of course, the outcome Dick intended to achieve.

None of them said anything while Tim finished up Jason’s last stitch. He snipped away the excess, then pushed Jason’s shoulder with his foot and said, “You’re all done.” He scrubbed the blood off his fingers with sanitizer, and immediately got up to go over to a pile of something brown that looked suspiciously like the remains of his terrible acid flower.

Jason got to his feet and pulled his shirt back down. As usual, Dick was taken aback by how tall he was. It had been a couple of years since Jason officially outgrew Dick, but he had a terrible suspicion that Jason was somehow still growing, and Dick didn’t think he would ever get over it. If Jason grew anymore he would be as tall and broad as Batman.

“That stings like a bitch,” Jason said, and slowly twisted and stretched his back and arms to test the stitches.

“Don’t pull those out right after I’ve stitched you up,” Tim said.

“Thanks, mom,” Jason said, and came over to stand next to Dick. Then, for no reason at all, he punched Dick’s arm.

“Ow! What was that for?” Dick said, rubbing his shoulder.

“Looks like you might need some stitches too,” Jason said, eyeing the tear in Dick’s Stray suit.

Dick touched the tear. The cut on his side was mostly clotted up by now, but a bit of blood was seeping through. Maybe Jason was right and the wound did need stitches. Tim couldn’t be the one to stitch him up, though, because Dick wasn’t immune to all of the toxins on Tim’s skin like Jay and Harley were. He would have to take care of it later on his own.

“The kid did it. He threw one of those boomerangs at me,” Dick said, mimicking throwing one.

Jason narrowed his eyes, but didn’t say anything.

“What?” Dick asked him.

“I don’t get it,” Jason said, shaking his head.

“What? The kid?” Dick said.

“Yes. I mean, I heard the rumors that he was letting the kid be one of his partners, but I guess I didn’t really believe it until tonight. The fact that he has a kid at all doesn’t surprise me. Accidents happen, I guess even to the Bat. But to give him a costume and make him his partner?”

“Batman’s had sidekicks for years,” Tim reminded Jason. “Batgirl. Spoiler. Spoiler as Batgirl, who is now Spoiler again. The next Batgirl after Spoiler, who is now Black Bat. The current Batgirl with the blue helmet. It’s like he builds sidekicks in a lab or something. It must be convenient to get one biologically.”

“No, the girls I get,” Jason said, waving a hand. “They’re like him, you know? But the kid isn’t. Batman’s supposed to be some champion of justice, but then he goes and makes his little murder baby his sidekick too? The kid who went around Gotham trying to cut off people’s heads with a sword?”

“Maybe he’s had a change of heart. The kid, I mean,” Dick said.

Jason snorted and said, “That monster? I doubt it. People change but they don’t change that much. I mean, for fuck’s sake, we’re talking about the boy who killed Joker.”

“You’re just bitter because he beat you to it,” Tim said.

“Maybe just a little,” Jason snapped.

Deep down, Dick didn’t quite understand it either. There wasn’t much that Batman’s enemies knew about the man behind the cowl, but one thing they did know was that he didn’t kill. The rumor was that it took him years to reconcile with Spoiler after she killed Cluemaster, and that was in self-defense. But then Batboy—or Rook, or whatever he called himself—showed up and went around Gotham with his sword on some kind of bloodthirsty campaign to destroy his father’s enemies. His hit list had included the Sirens and the other boys, but while they had all survived their encounters with the kid, the Joker did not survive his.

Of course, no one was complaining about the fact that Rook put a blade through Joker’s heart and tossed his body in the harbor—Gotham had been almost pleasant ever since he did—but it was a choice that conflicted with Batman’s beliefs about killing, and those beliefs helped Dick, Tim, and Jason sleep soundly at night. So no, Dick didn’t like or trust the Batkid anymore than Tim or Jason did just because he was an official part of the Bat crowd now, and hadn’t forgotten about that whole attempting to murder them thing. He agreed with them that Rook was a threat, even with Batman watching his every move.

That’s why it was so annoying that he still felt a twinge of guilt for tossing the kid over that railing.

“Batman’s a weird guy,” Dick said. “Who knows how his mind works. I guess he has to have a reason for letting the kid fight at his side.”

“Must be a pretty damn good one,” Jason muttered.

On the ground, Tim twitched and he turned to look toward a corner of the dark basement.

“What is it?” Dick asked him.

“She’s here,” Tim said.

“Ivy?” Jason asked.

“All of them, actually.”

Goosebumps rose on Dick's arms and he repressed a shiver. Sometimes the creepy magic plant stuff was too weird for him.

“Ah, shit. Already?” Jason asked.

“Apparently,” Tim said.

Dick listened. True to Tim’s word, soon Dick could hear footsteps and voices. Harley’s voice, in particular.

“—that’s what I’m saying, Red!”

“Harley, I can’t take three weeks off from my work to go to Australia with you,” Ivy said.

Tim got up and stood between Jason and Dick.

“Why not? I want to see a kangaroo!”

“You’ve seen one before,” Ivy said.

The conversation ended as the three women walked into the light. Harley and Selina were in their suits, and Ivy looked deceptively soft and delicate in a forest green pea coat and matching green heels. The three of them saw Dick, Tim, and Jason, and—almost as if they’d practiced it beforehand—they stopped and crossed their arms over their chests.

Dick didn’t have to ask how they found them. Ivy always seemed to be able to sense where Tim was.

“Boys,” Selina said.

For a tense moment, no one said anything at all, and the Sirens glared at them. Tim was a hunched over a little and hugging his arms to his chest, like he was trying to make himself as small as possible. Jason was smirking, the little shit.

The moment dragged on. Somewhere in the shadows of the basement, something dripped.

At long last, Harley burst out laughing.

“Harley!” Ivy and Selina said at once.

Harley laughed harder, so hard that she leaned back and nearly toppled over backwards in her heeled boots. Jason’s smirk got wider.

Without a word, Harley dropped her hammer. She ran over and threw herself into Jason’s arms. She was a lot smaller than Jay, but she jumped high enough to get her arms around his neck. Jason held her up and she gave him a smacking kiss on the cheek.

“Oh, come on Harley,” Jason said. He tried to rub the red kiss print away with the back of his hand, but all he achieved was smearing it all over his face.

“Beating up Batman in a department store! That one is a classic!” Harley said as he let her go.

“Harley!” Ivy hissed.

“Oh, right,” Harley said. She put her hands on her hips and glared up at Jason. She wagged a finger and said, “What do you think you’re doing, fighting Batman? I told you to stay away from him, young man!”

“He came after me,” Jason said.

“Oh, well in that case—”

“No,” Ivy said, glaring at Harley now. “No ‘in that case’. What is the one rule we have at the house?”

“Don’t fight Batman,” Tim said.

“Exactly,” Ivy said, turning her glare back over to him. Tim avoided eye contact and kicked an old pen on the ground.

Ivy went over to Tim while Selina came stand at Dick’s side.

Dick turned and smiled at his mentor. She returned the smile, her sternness gone now that Ivy was focused on Tim and Harley was focused on Jay. Dick heard Ivy ask Tim, “What happened?”

“I followed Dick and Jason and Batman turned up,” Tim told her.

“Is that true?” Selina asked Dick quietly.

“Yes,” Dick told her. “Jason followed me and Tim followed him. Somebody saw us and tweeted about it. I guess his little spy must have found out about it and sent him our way.”

“Hmm,” Selina said.

For a while they stood there in companionable silence while Harley babbled at Jay and Ivy interrogated Tim. Dick knew that Selina wasn’t mad at him, not really, and wouldn’t even be particularly disappointed. He was older than the other two, way past his getting grounded years—not that Selina had ever resorted to grounding him—and had been at this whole Stray thing for a while. That Jason and Tim had followed him wasn’t _his_ fault.

She did say, “Fighting Batman is a bad idea.”

“Believe it or not, fighting Batman wasn’t the dumbest thing somebody did tonight,” he told her.

She gave him a quizzical look, so he explained about meeting the Batboy, and later hurling him off the ledge so Tim and Jason had a chance to get away.

“You’re right. Threatening Batman’s kid is a terrible idea.”

“Is he going to be pissed at you?” Dick asked.

Selina’s lips, dark and shiny with cherry red lipstick, curved into a small smile.

“He’s always a little pissed at me. He’ll get over it.”

“I tried not to hurt him,” Dick said. The words sounded defensive, even to his own ears.

“I’m sure,” she said.

Meanwhile, Ivy was done lecturing Tim and they were going to stand over the remains of the acid flower.

“I don’t know what happened to it,” Tim told her, crouching down next to it. “The smaller ones were able to use the acid just fine and it didn’t negatively affect them. I can’t think of a reason why the larger flower would have died.”

“That is odd,” Ivy said, bending over for a better look.

Behind them, Harley was fussing over Jason’s wound. She wanted to see it and kept trying to pull the back of his shirt up, so they spun around and around as Jason tried to bat her hands away.

“Honestly, it doesn’t hurt that much.”

“That ugly flying rat better watch his back! I’m going to scratch him for scratching you,” she said.  

“Don’t worry, I already scratched him pretty bad,” Jason said.

Harley laughed, delighted, and said, “That’s my Little Jay!”

Selina’s head turned one way and the other, examining the little they could see of the dark basement.

“What is it?” Dick asked her.

For a minute he thought she wouldn’t answer him, but then she said, “Why this building?”

Dick looked around.

“I don’t know. It’s empty, but it’s in pretty good shape. Tim found it. Or, plants found it and told him, or something. He says he’s going to use it as a lab. Why?”

For a moment Selina said nothing, and Dick had to wonder again if she was going to share whatever it was that was on her mind.

“You know Brucie Wayne has some kind of…friendship with Batman,” she said.

“You think we should leave?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Tim’s not going to like that. He’s already put a lot of work into the alarms.”

“He can find a new place. A better place. One not owned by Wayne Enterprises,” Selina said. “I can help if he needs it.”

“I don’t think he’ll need it,” Dick said.

It was a pain, but Selina was the expert when it came to the Bat. She had never confirmed it, and he had never asked, but he was pretty sure that she knew who he really was under that cowl. So if she said they should leave the Wayne Enterprises building then there was no good reason not to do it.

“I’ll talk to him in the morning,” Dick said. Tim was busy talking to Ivy now, alert and passionate in a way that he only ever seemed to be around her. It was the closest he ever seemed to get to something like happiness, and Dick didn’t want to spoil it.

“Let’s go home,” Selina said, turning away from the others.

“I should stay somewhere where Batman can’t find me,” Dick told her.

Selina smirked and said, “I think I can protect you from Batman tonight, should he decide to come out for revenge. Ladies, we’re leaving.”

Harley and Ivy were too busy talking to Jason and Tim and didn’t hear her. The boys were just as distracted as Harley and Ivy. Dick took one last look at them, annoyed at himself for being so relieved they had made it through the night alive and safe and more or less in one piece, then turned and followed Catwoman back out into the night.


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was halfway through an article about a robbery that may or may not have been committed by Stray when Gordon said, “If you’re determined to read the entire file then you’re going to run out of time to write your report.”
> 
> Damian ignored her.
> 
> “Or...you could see if someone who you know who has an eidetic memory knows whatever it is that you are trying to find out.”

Damian made his way down to the cave around lunchtime.

He would have preferred that the cave be empty when he got down there—Father was out of the house dealing with Wayne Enterprises business, and Alfred was in the kitchen preparing lunch—so he was disappointed to get down there to find Brown and Cassandra sparring. They were too preoccupied to stop and bother him, so he slipped past them to the computer.

The previous evening’s humiliations were fresh on his mind. Bruises were starting to bloom all over his chest and legs from when Stray had thrown him, and Row had given him a pitying look that morning at breakfast. He meant to start writing his report, but found himself navigating through Father’s catalog of criminal files instead, looking for the one named _Stray: Richard “Dick” Grayson_.

It was a large file. He didn’t really know where to begin, so he picked a random article and began to read. After a couple of minutes, his one-eyed cat, Puck, jumped up onto his lap and began to purr. He stroked Puck’s silky black fur as he read.

He’d been reading for about thirty minutes when a window popped up on the screen.

“ _Good afternoon, Damian_ ,” Gordon said, smiling at him on the monitor. “ _What are you doing?_ ”

Damian glared up at her and said, “I fail to see how it is any of your business.”

“ _Everything that happens on this computer is my business._ ”

Damian closed the window. Perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised or annoyed when it just popped up again another second later, but he was.

“ _Aren’t you supposed to be writing a report about what happened last night?_ ” Gordon asked.

“Am I not allowed to do research that is relevant to my report?”

“ _Hmmm...I guess that’s allowed,_ ” she said.

“Thank you,” he said, icily polite, then he minimized her window, knowing all the while that just because she wasn’t saying anything didn’t mean that she wasn’t watching both him and his screen.

Richard “Dick” Grayson’s file was large, one of the largest that Damian had ever found on his father’s computer. There were newspaper articles about the man, copies of his birth certificate, passport, and various IDs, lists of known aliases, even a section of interviews his father had conducted with Grayson’s friends and previous lovers. Father had really done his research.

He was halfway through an article about a robbery that may or may not have been committed by Stray when Gordon said, “ _If you’re determined to read the entire file then you’re going to run out of time to write your report._ ”

Damian ignored her.

“ _Or...you could see if someone who you know who has an eidetic memory knows whatever it is that you are trying to find out_.”

“Perhaps I do not know yet what it is that I am attempting to find out,” Damian said.

“ _I see_ ,” Gordon said. “ _I knew him, you know. Back when I was Batgirl._ ”

“Yes, I am aware. I have already made my way through the list of Stray’s former lovers, and you were one of the names on the list.”

It was a very long list.

“ _Funny_ ,” she said.

Damian closed out of the article about the robbery—whoever it was who did it, they were never caught—and moved on to the next article. This one was about the death of Stray’s parents.

“ _They died, and it wasn’t even about them or anything that they did. Tony Zucco killed them because he wanted money out of C.C. Haly._ ”

“I can read,” Damian said.

Gordon went on talking anyway.

“ _Stray spent about a year in the foster system after their deaths. He bounced around from_ _house to house until Selina Kyle heard a rumor about a kid who could do some crazy acrobatics. She asked him if he would like to help her with a job in exchange for ten thousand dollars. Dick was going to use the money to run away, but he ended up staying with Selina._ ”

Almost in spite of himself, Damian found himself asking, “Why?”

“ _She liked him. He loves to be liked. His parents were dead and staying with her was way better than living in foster homes. Also, he’s an adrenaline junkie, and there’s nothing quite like the thrill of pulling off a theft that almost no one else alive could possibly pull off. He couldn’t walk away from the life._ ”

Gordon opened a new window. This section of Stray’s file was a chart with calculations of how much money Stray was estimated to have stolen over the years. There was an additional section for lists of robberies that were witnessed by Batman and others that may or may not have been committed by Stray. The first list was perhaps a tenth of the length of the second one.

“Why hasn’t he been caught yet?” Damian asked.

“ _He’s that good._ ”

“He has to have slipped up at least once.”

“ _If he has, we haven’t found the evidence._ ”

Gordon opened a new article. The headline over this one said _Catwoman’s Stray: Urban Legend?_

“ _Part of it is that he tends to be more careful than Selina. Also, he used to step in as an assistant during the escape artist’s bits while he was living with the circus. He’s slippery. I learned that many, many times._ ”

Damian was about to ask another question, but Gordon was apparently done talking about Dick Grayson. Up on the screen, Stray’s file closed and a new one opened. This one was labeled _Jack of Clubs: Jason Todd_.

“ _Jason grew up in Crime Alley. His father was in and out of jail for various offenses throughout Jason's childhood, and his mother was a drug addict. He was behind bars when Jason’s mother died of an overdose, so Jason ended up on the streets._ ”

Gordon opened a subsection of Jason Todd’s file. It was labeled _Jester_ , and at the top there was a photograph of Jason Todd as an adolescent. Garish red, white, and gold makeup was smeared all over the boy’s thin, stony face.

“ _Jason had the unfortunate luck to run into the Joker when he was thirteen. Joker abducted Jason and started calling him Jester. Since Jason was homeless, and there was nobody around to look out for him, it was days before Batman finally got word. Your Father attempted to intervene, but Joker disappeared with both Harley and Jason and they didn’t resurface for over six months._ ”

Gordon opened up a new file. It was a newspaper article accompanied by a dark photograph of Harley Quinn out on a city street holding something large bundled in her arms. That was the street in Crime Alley where Dr. Thompkins had her office. Damian recognized the bodega on the corner.

“ _The following summer, an incident occurred and Joker tried to shoot Harley. Jason got in the way and the bullet passed through his thigh. Harley took Jason and ran to Dr. Thompkins for help. Dr. Thompkins was able to help Jason, but once again, Harley and Jason disappeared before Batman could intervene._ ”

Gordon closed out of the article and pulled up an older photograph of Jack of Clubs. Jason Todd was much shorter and thinner in this picture, and his suit didn’t have the white Jack of Clubs painted on it yet. He was holding the spiked club, however, and all of the red, gold, and white makeup was gone, replaced instead by the white mask.

“ _Jason started going out with Harley while she was out causing her usual brand of mayhem and disorder. Her nickname for him is Little Jay. Eventually people started calling him Jack of Clubs, and the nickname stuck._ ”

Behind him, Damian could hear someone approaching. Damian turned and saw Brown and Cassandra coming up from the sparring level.

“What’s going on, rookie?” Brown asked him. She had retrieved a bag of chips from somewhere and was crunching on them in a way that was loud and impolite but sadly not out of character. She saw the collection of articles and pictures up on the screen and her eyes lit up. “We’re looking at the Sirens’ sons files?”

“ _We_ are not looking at anything,” Damian said. “And I take offense—”

“ _I am giving Damian some background information about Stray, Jack of Clubs, and Nightshade_ ,” Gordon said.

“Ooh, Babs is here,” Brown said. She threw herself into the other chair and put her feet up on one of the control panels. “Cass, Babs is here!”

Cassandra came over as well and leaned against a server. She said, “Hello.”

Gordon said, “ _Hello girls_ ,” at the same time Damian said, “Go away. You both smell like sweat and Brown is annoying.”

“I fought Jack of Clubs once,” Brown said, ignoring Damian. She stuffed three of the salt and vinegar chips into her mouth and said, “It got nasty.”

Behind her, Cassandra wrinkled her nose and said, “Easy.”

“Yeah, of course _you_ think fighting him is easy,” Brown said.

“He does not hit well,” Cassandra said. “Thinks we are...delicate.”

“Insulting,” Brown said.

“ _Jack of Clubs doesn’t like to hit women, so as a result he doesn’t fight a woman the way he would fight with another man, even if the woman in question is as skilled as he is. That’s how he got arrested the first time, you know. He wasn’t taking a fight with Huntress as seriously as he needed to, and she beat him._ ”

“Made...mistake once. Not again,” Cass said.

“With you or with Huntress?” Brown asked.

“Both,” Cass said. “Hits me...fine...now.”

Brown cackled.

“ _Fighting with Jack of Clubs isn’t a wise idea, regardless of he feels about fighting women,_ ” Gordon said, her tone stern. “ _So far there have been three men who died from injuries sustained during fights with Jack of Clubs, and many others have been left permanently disfigured or handicapped._ ”

Up on the screen, the file for Jack of Clubs disappeared, and a new one came up. _Nightshade: Timothy Drake_.

“ _Timothy Jackson Drake, the youngest of the three. Coincidentally, a former neighbor of Bruce Wayne. He became an orphan when he was thirteen, after his parents were murdered overseas_.”

Gordon opened another article. This one had a large photograph of a short, frail boy in a black suit. He was standing in a graveyard next to an elderly woman in a black dress, his arms crossed tightly over his chest.

“ _Timothy was briefly taken in by a housekeeper, but became an emancipated youth when he was fifteen. He graduated early from high school and was accepted to Ivy University. He was studying late on campus one night when he heard a disturbance in the lab next door._ ”

A photo of a balding Caucasian man popped up on the monitor.

“ _Dr. David Porter was attempting to replicate the experiment that turned Pamela Isley into Poison Ivy. He believed that if he could make himself a plant human hybrid like her, she would love him. Only Timothy Drake ended up getting doused with the formula instead when he came to investigate what was going on.”_

Before and after images of Timothy Drake appeared on the screen. The first was an image of him at what presumably was his high school graduation ceremony. He was smiling, and his short dark hair was neatly combed and gelled flat. In the second picture Timothy Drake’s tangled dark hair came down to his chin. His eyes were darker, more of a purple than a blue color, and his gaunt face was tinged green. He wasn’t smiling anymore.

“ _Dr. Porter died because he touched Timothy’s skin. Timothy was overwhelmed by his powers, so he left to find the only person who could possibly understand what had happened to him: Poison Ivy._ ”

Gordon pulled up a list of Nightshade’s abilities.

“ _Like Ivy, Timothy can control and communicate with plants. He feels what they feel and he can help them grow faster, although he doesn’t seem to have the range of control over them that Ivy has. His skin, however, is much more toxic than hers. Most of the deaths that have occurred happened because people who were warned not to touch him did it anyway._ ”

“Most of?” Damian asked.

“ _Batman is not convinced that Dr. Porter touched Timothy willingly. He hasn’t been able to prove it, but he believes that Dr. Porter, as the creator of the experiment, would have known that touching Timothy in that state would be a very bad idea._ ”

“So Nightshade killed him.”

“ _Maybe. Like I said, it’s a hypothesis. Timothy hasn’t gone out of his way to kill anyone since he became Nightshade. He always targets buildings, unoccupied ones, not people. Most of the time he’s the first one to warn someone that they shouldn’t touch him. It’s possible Timothy touched Dr. Porter on accident, not knowing what would happen to him. Only he knows what really happened that night._ ”

“The whole not touching him thing also makes him really hard to catch,” Brown said.

“And fight,” Cassandra said.

“ _He is tough to catch, but Batman has managed it before._ ”

“How?” Damian asked.

All Gordon said was, “ _Traps._ ” Damian did not find that very helpful.

“Stephanie,” Cassandra said. Damian and Brown both turned to look at Cassandra, who pointed at the monitor and shook her head. “Nightshade...tricked her. Not allowed to fight...anymore.”

Brown rolled her eyes and said, “That was one time!”

Cassandra grinned.

“ _Nightshade was a nonentity for most of the first year after receiving his powers. He helped Ivy with minor plans, but stayed behind the scenes and far away from the trouble until his and Ivy’s attack on Hempstead Incorporated, after which they were both arrested. The prosecutor wanted Nightshade to be sent to jail, but it was thanks to Batman that Nightshade was sent to a psychiatric facility instead._ ”

“Tt.”

Gordon ignored him and kept talking.

“ _Coincidentally, about two and a half weeks after Nightshade was admitted, Jason Todd was arrested for fighting a police officer. Batman intervened again on Jason’s behalf, and Jason was also admitted to the same facility where Timothy was receiving treatment. Sending them to the same place turned out to be a mistake, because they worked together to escape three days later.”_

Damian raised an eyebrow and frowned.

Gordon was still watching him through the cave’s cameras, so she noticed his expression and said, “ _What?_ ”

He almost ignored her simply because he found her nosiness irritating, but his desire to ask the question overruled this other impulse.

“Why did Father intervene? They are criminals. Do they not deserve to go to jail?” he asked.

For a moment, Gordon didn’t say anything. Even Brown had ceased her crunching on the chips.

“ _Well, I suppose that’s because in a way, he believes that there is still a chance to save them_.”

“Save them?” Damian repeated, disbelieving. “From what?”

Three files popped up on the screen. They were three different rap sheets for three different men named Jacob Falcone, Nicolas Bennington, and Victor Chase.

“ _These are Jason Todd’s victims. Falcone was a mafia hitman who was accused of beating his wife, but the judge didn’t convict him. She vanished three months later and hasn’t been seen or heard from since. Bennington was a pedophile. Chase was involved in human trafficking and knowingly sold drugs laced with a strain of Scarecrow’s fear toxin. Beating them to the point of death isn’t how your father would have handled it, but if you look closely at the files, and obvious pattern emerges. Todd has a strong sense of justice, mostly likely due to the fact that he grew up in a household with an abusive father, and then later his experiences with the Joker. He’s a brawler, sure, but he doesn’t get angry for no reason._ ”

The files disappeared and another series of articles came up. Some of these were all about various levels of destruction to private property caused by Nightshade. The others were think pieces about whether or not what Nightshade was doing was ethical.

“ _Nightshade tends to focus most of his energy on unveiling dirty corporate secrets. If somebody is causing damage to the environment, he finds out about it, and he reveals it, even if he has to break something to do it. There are many citizens of Gotham who consider his actions heroic._ ”

“Tt.”

“ _That you disagree doesn’t make it untrue_ ,” Gordon said.

“So they are not as terrible as they could be,” Damian said, narrowing his eyes. “I still fail to comprehend why my father would interfere on their behalf.”

Brown snorted and said, “Your stupid dad is doing the exact same thing for you, dummy.”

“ _Stephanie_ ,” Gordon said.

Damian turned his head so that he could glare at her. She held up her arms in a placating gesture and said, “I’m just saying.”

Fighting Brown would only serve to make his father think less of him, and he was already on bad terms with him after last night. He had to repeat that to himself several times before he was convinced to not attack her.

“ _What Stephanie is trying to say is that your father has faith in rehabilitation,_ ” Gordon said. “ _Quite frankly, Jack of Clubs would only have more opportunities to cause mayhem if he was sent to Blackgate. Criminals are probably safer with him on the outside rather than on the inside. And Nightshade is a young, powerful metahuman who was alone for most of his adolescence. Sending him away from the only three people in Gotham who can touch him without dying could only have detrimental effects upon his state of mind. In short, they aren’t supervillains yet, but with the right conditions, they could be._ ”

Damian ran his fingers through Puck’s soft fur and asked, “What about Stray?”

The question made Gordon pause.

“ _Dick Grayson? What about him?_ ”

“You didn’t have anything to say in defense of him.”

“ _Well...Dick Grayson is kind of a different situation. He knows what he’s doing is illegal. He hasn’t killed anyone, though, so it’s not quite the same._ ”

Damian shrugged this off and said, “Dick Grayson is an adult. As you said, he knows that what he is doing is illegal. Since he has not yet been caught, I assume he has the skills and intelligence to succeed in a legal profession. Yet he chooses to continue stealing from others. Father is aware of Stray’s civilian identity, and has enough evidence to have in convict him. But Stray walks free. Why does Batman not expose Dick Grayson for what he really is?”

Gordon did not say anything for several seconds.

It was Cassandra who finally said, “Stray is...kind.”

Damian turned to face her, disbelieving.

“Have you already forgotten what Stray did to me last night?” he demanded.

“He’s usually kind. To people who deserve it, anyway,” Brown said.

Fury flared in Damian’s gut. He opened his mouth to retort, but Gordon spoke before he could.

“ _Stephanie, that’s enough. If you’re only here to pick fights then go away.”_

Brown shrugged and said, “Fine. Come on, Cass. Alfred should be done with lunch by now.”

Brown got up and went over to Cassandra. She nudged the other girl and they headed for the stairs and up into the manor.

When they were gone, Gordon said, “ _Damian, Stray doesn’t act in a way that is malicious. He steals from corporations, from museums, from institutions, and only rarely from individuals, and even then only the ones who are rich enough to get by without whatever it was he took. Also, he goes out of his way to restrain his opponents so he can get away, not to fight them. He cares about people. Even yesterday, when he threw you to Batman, he did it so that Nightshade and Jack of Clubs could get away, not because he wanted to hurt you._ ”

Damian was unimpressed. He let his expression do the talking for him.

“ _Look, I know it may not make any sense to you, but your father knows what he is doing with them. It’s best for you to stay out of the way and not to get involved_.”

Damian twitched his shoulder, sort of like a shrug but not.

“ _Did you figure out what it was that you were trying to figure out_?” Gordon asked.

For a moment, Damian considered the question. Then purpose struck him, and Damian smiled a slow smile.

He nodded and said, “I think I did, yes.”

“ _Alright. And what was it_?”

So nosy. Damian didn’t know how his father could stand it.

“I need more information about Nightshade, Stray, and Jack of Clubs in general before I could write my report,” he lied. “I didn’t understand before, why my father let them go free, but now I do understand.”

“ _Ok...good. So you are going to write your report_?”

“Yes,” Damian said.

“ _Wonderful! I will leave you to it then_.”

“Thank you. Your assistance has been invaluable,” he said, ever so polite.

Perhaps he was overdoing it, but if he was, Gordon didn’t give any indication that she could tell something was amiss. She simply said goodbye and disconnected the feed.

She would still be monitoring his screen, even if she wasn’t talking to him, so he would in fact write his report. Father would still be expecting it too. The report seemed like a non-issue, however, more even than before. Damian knew what he really had to do now. His father and the girls were suffering from some kind of mass delusion. They believed that Stray—that Dick Grayson—was a good person, somewhere deep down under his charming facade and his thievery. But Damian knew better.

That was why Damian was going to be the one to finally catch him. 

* * *

It was patrol time, but Bruce was busy interrogating Damian about what had happened with the Sirens’ sons at the department store. Harper had the distinct impression that she was not supposed to be listening, but she also needed to clean her suit before she left for patrol, so she tucked herself around the corner by the equipment lockers and did her best to pretend like she couldn’t hear them as she scrubbed down the blue and black panels of her armor with some sharp-smelling chemical and a stiff-bristled brush.

“You are forgetting that I have fought Stray, Jack of Clubs, and Nightshade before,” Damian said.

“That isn’t the point and you know it,” Batman said.

“What is the point of allowing me to be your partner at all if I am not allowed to use my abilities?” Damian asked. “I have never heard you tell Row, Cain, or Brown that they are not allowed to fight someone and I am by far the superior fighter.”

Harper directed a disbelieving look in the direction of their voices and shook her head. It was a good thing Steph wasn’t around. Stephanie couldn’t handle it when Damian had the audacity to claim he was a better fighter than Cass.

“If you don’t hear me saying it, that is because I don’t have to tell Harper, Stephanie, or Cassandra when an opponent is too dangerous to fight. They are self-aware and understand their limitations. I have to be able to trust that you will not make reckless choices, because reckless choices are how people end up hurt or dead.”

Harper’s eyes flickered up and over to the display case, to Carrie Kelley’s black, yellow, and green Batgirl uniform.

It wasn’t that Harper thought Bruce was wrong, per se, but she didn’t fully agree with him either. Everything that Harper had ever read about Carrie had led her to the understanding that Carrie had been the perfect partner. She was smart, she was skilled, and Bruce had loved and trusted her in a way that he hadn’t loved or trusted any of his sidekicks since. She’d obeyed Batman’s orders the night she died, she had done all the right things—and the Joker had found her and killed her anyway. Doing what they did, there were no guarantees. Sometimes a reckless choice saved your life. Sometimes the smart ones couldn’t save you.

“You told me not to fight the Sirens,” Damian said. “You told me to retreat if they came after me. But the Sirens were not there. You never told me I was not allowed to fight Stray, and at that time we did not know that Nightshade was in the building.”

Bruce didn’t say anything.

“Am I incorrect?” Damian asked, impatient.

Bruce, still, didn’t say anything. Harper kept scrubbing, but the scrape of the brush on her armor sounded loud in the silence.

Finally, Damian made his usual derisive noise.

“You’re going to take the rest of the week off,” Batman said.

“But Father—”

“No arguments, Damian,” Bruce said.

“You’re _grounding_ me?”

“You aren’t grounded. Do your homework. Watch a movie. Play video games with Jon. Be a normal kid.”

“I am not interested in being a child. I want to patrol with you,” Damian said.

“Harper will be patrolling with me tonight.”

Harper flinched at the sound of her own name and almost dropped the brush. Damian was quiet for a long moment.

“Fine. Take the novice with you,” Damian finally said.

There were footsteps, and then suddenly there was Damian coming around the corner. His expression was thunderous, and when he saw Harper the expression only got stormier.

He gave her a long look of absolute disdain, but didn’t say anything. Instead he went right past her and headed up the stairs to the elevator, not stopping to take off his Rook suit first. Alfred said they weren’t supposed to wear their suits in the manor, but Harper didn’t dare remind Damian of that when he was already so pissed off, especially not since she was now part of the reason why. The kid already resented her enough anyway.

“Harper?” said Bruce, calling out to her.

“Yes, Batman?”

“Oracle has been trying to contact the cave for over twenty minutes. She says that something resembling one of Professor Pyg’s dollotrons was spotted over in Amusement Mile.”

Harper repressed a shudder. She didn’t like any of Gotham’s villains, but Professor Pyg was definitely one of the more repulsive. She would have to finish cleaning her armor when she got back, then.

“I’m coming,” Harper said.

She quickly put the rest of her armor on. First the breastplate, with the blue batgirl symbol stretching over her chest. The gauntlets and greaves came next. She picked up her helmet last, rubbing a smudge off the pointed ears. She didn’t love the helmet, but Batman said she had to wear it because her purple hair was too distinctive. It also protected her head if she fell.

Harper glanced at Carrie Kelley’s Batgirl suit again before she turned to go. For a moment she could see it in her mind—how Carrie must have looked, invincible and brilliant, her short red hair curling in the wind as she swung through Gotham in the iconic yellow and green colors that none of the other Batgirls had dared to wear since.

Harper put on her helmet and went to join Batman.


	4. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For a long, drawn out moment, Dick and Batman stared at each other. Batgirl was silent and still as a robot, but Selina shot bemused glances between her lover and her ward.
> 
> After a while of this masculine glaring and looming, Selina couldn’t help but smile a little. Men were so ridiculous.

There were a lot of things that Cullen Row liked about living at Wayne Manor. Alfred was great. The house itself was cool, way better than any apartment where Cullen had ever lived with Harper or his dad. Also there were like, eleven rooms that had giant TVs and Bruce and the girls were always busy so he hardly ever had competition for them. Sometimes Wayne Manor was so starkly different—so starkly better—than his old life that he was sure he was dead and had been sent to heaven.

There were some other things he didn’t like, though. Wayne Manor was huge, which was cool, but it was difficult to get around with only one leg. Harper was a lot busier and a lot more stressed now that she was Batgirl. Some weeks he hardly saw her at all.

Also there was Damian Wayne.

Damian was...fine. He didn’t seem to be terribly interested in Cullen. He had days where he actually acknowledged Cullen’s existence. Sometimes that was a positive thing. Sometimes it wasn’t.

On that day in particular he showed up in the room where Cullen was playing video games, sat down on a chair, and...didn’t say anything. Cullen ignored him and kept playing, figuring Damian would get bored and wander off eventually. But then Damian stayed for over an hour.

Cullen knew Damian was grounded for some reason, but he didn’t have any details other than that. It was Bat drama, and Cullen tried to stay out of that.

“Do you want to play?” Cullen finally asked, because it seemed like the polite thing to do.

Damian didn’t say anything. It was almost like he wasn’t there, except Cullen hadn’t heard him leave and could see Damian’s feet in his peripheral vision. Cullen paused the game.

When he turned around, he found that Damian was glaring at him. The other boy’s arms were crossed over his chest.

“No?” Cullen said.

Damian just kept glaring.

“We could play something else. This game is a little tough for someone who doesn’t really play video games, but I have some easier multiplayer games too,” Cullen said.

Damian sniffed contemptuously.

“I have more important things to do than play useless games.”

Cullen wanted to point out that Damian had spent the past hour glaring at the back of his head, but thought better of it. The kid was an assassin, after all. Even if Cullen was pretty positive Damian wouldn’t kill him it still seemed like a bad idea to provoke him.

“Ok. Well, if you change your mind,” Cullen said. Then a different idea occurred to him, and he asked,  “Want to watch My Hero Academia?”

Damian’s eyes narrowed into slits.

“It’s this anime about superheroes,” Cullen explained. “This kid who doesn’t have any superpowers in a world where almost everybody does ends up meeting the world’s most powerful hero. I think you would like it. Bakugou specifically.”

Without a word, Damian got up from the chair and walked out of the room.

Cullen watched him go. He wondered if he should feel insulted…

...But at least the problem was solved, one way or the other.

Cullen shrugged and turned back around to unpause his game. He kept playing until Alfred showed up to make him take a break. Sooner or later, he totally forgot that Damian had ever come by at all. 

* * *

“Are you suggesting that I can’t handle one security guard?” Selina asked, glaring at Dick.

“I didn’t say that,” Dick said, rubbing ketchup off his cheek.

“Good,” Selina said, and leaned back in her chair.

Technically it wasn’t her chair at all. It belonged to the CEO’s whose balcony they were using as a meeting place, but neither Selina nor Dick cared about trifles like trespassing. The night was cold and a little foggy, but the streets over in the Financial District were quieter than usual, almost peaceful.

This was Gotham, so the peace wouldn’t hold—but she was determined to enjoy it while it lasted.

“You could get past the guard, but could you get past the alarm? The whole system was replaced a year ago. They put in a bunch of new cameras and they have motion sensors now,” Dick said, and took a huge bite out of his burger.

“Who doesn’t? The better question is what the hell would I steal from The Gotham Museum of Science and History?” Selina said.

“A dinosaur bone?” Dick suggested.

“I have one for you. Sabbatini Brothers Jewelry Company,” she said.

Dick grinned. He finished the rest of his burger and said, “Through the back door, into the office where they process the deliveries.”

When she frowned, he told her, “I may have already robbed it.”

“I see. At night?”

“During the day, actually. They’re open all weekend and closed on Mondays. The alleyway behind the shop is pretty dark so I didn’t even wear my suit. I waltzed in there in broad daylight, dressed in jeans and a hoodie.”

She shot him a doubtful look. His grin got wider, and his eyes sparkled.

“The great thing about being a thief in Gotham is that everybody’s so paranoid about a certain someone who likes to come in through the roof at night. Nobody expects a guy to sneak in through the back door in broad daylight,” he said.

Selina narrowed her eyes at him.

“I should give you a cut, since you make things so easy for me,” he said as he dug into his fries.

Selina shoved him playfully. He tried to shift out of the way, but didn’t quite make it and squawked with indignation when she knocked the fries out of his hand.

“Look, you’re wasting perfectly good food. Food I paid for with my hard earned money,” he said.

She scoffed, and was about to say something else, but then she heard a familiar _crack_ over the noise of the traffic below. Dick heard it too and stiffened.

“Shit,” he said, seconds before a huge dark shape descended.

Batman landed in a crouch on the balcony railing. Slowly the Dark Knight straightened, looming over them like some massive specter of death. Fog swirled around him, claiming him as a part of the night.

It was an impressive entrance, but Selina wasn’t particularly impressed or threatened by his entrances anymore. The Dark Knight kind of lost his aura of danger and mystique once she knew it was Bruce Wayne under the cowl.

Also, she had different reactions to him now. Ones that were more fun.

There was another _crack_ , and the new Batgirl landed on the railing near him. Her landing wasn’t as smooth; she teetered for a moment and had to jump down onto the concrete in front of them.

Dick and Selina didn’t get up.

“Hello Batman,” Selina said. She smiled as she took her time looking him over.

“Catwoman,” Batman said, and then he looked at Dick.

For a long, drawn out moment, Dick and Batman stared at each other. Batgirl was silent and still as a robot, but Selina shot bemused glances between her lover and her ward.

After a while of this masculine glaring and looming, Selina couldn’t help but smile a little. Men were so ridiculous.

Bruce must have noticed the smile, because he said, “Batgirl.”

Batgirl’s helmet turned up to him.

“Go help Black Bat patrol over in Burnley,” he said.

Batgirl nodded. At once she lifted up her grappling gun, fired, and was gone.

Selina turned to Dick and jerked her head at him. Dick frowned at her, and his eyebrows creased with worry. It was kind of cute that he was anxious for her—cute, but unnecessary. Selina raised one of her own dark eyebrows and he finally got up and pulled out his whip. Then he went as well.

When they were alone, Selina turned back to Batman. He was still giving her the silent treatment, and he was frowning. This was normal for him, but it seemed like an even more judgmental frown than she was used to.

Finally, Batman jumped down from the railing. He didn’t come any closer. Selina leaned back in the chair and crossed one leg over the other, surveying him.

“Are you upset with me?” she asked.

He didn’t answer the question.

“He feels bad about it, you know. He didn’t want to hurt your boy. Is the little bird alright?” she asked.

Batman grunted. For a moment she thought he was going to keep sulking, but then he said, “Some bruises. Including a bruised ego.”

Selina’s mouth twitched up into another smile, and she got up. She eased over to him, slow and nonthreatening, the way she would approach a timid cat.

He didn’t move away. She reached him and placed a hand over the symbol on his chest.

“Do you think we could we skip the lecture this time?” she asked.

His frown, somehow, twisted into an even grimmer shape.

It was a point of contention between the two of them. He wanted her, but he didn’t want to want her. He disapproved of how she’d taken in an eleven year-old so many years ago and turned him into a thief. She didn’t think his tendency to make lost girls into soldiers was that different, somehow better than what she’d done with Dick.

Sometimes they didn’t think about the kids. Sometimes he could get over it, and give in to her. Sometimes he couldn’t.

They didn’t rehash the usual argument. There was no point.

“One day Dick is going to make a mistake. He is going to get caught,” Batman said.

“Is that so?” she asked.

“You could talk to him. If it was you who asked him to, he would quit.”

“You don’t know him as well as I do,” she said. “Like I’ve said before, I’m not his mother. I’ve always been more of a big sister to him and little brothers aren’t very good at listening to their big sisters sometimes. I could only ever influence him to a point.”

Batman stared down at her. For a thrilling moment, she thought that he would close the gap between them, that he was going to kiss her. She leaned forward and breathed in his scent. She was addicted to it.

He did lean in, just a fraction, but didn’t kiss her. Instead, he pulled away.

“I hope you’re prepared for a lifetime of consequences. I hope he is,” Batman said.

He jumped back onto the railing. His black cape snapped at her in the wind  and he leapt, vanishing into the fog. Selina stared at the spot where he’d disappeared. The night’s fragile peace was shattered, and now that he was gone, she felt robbed. 

* * *

There wasn’t much to do over on the East Side, but Damian knew it would be a bad idea to wander into any other part of the city. He’d left his mask with all of Oracle’s tech back at the Manor, but she’d still have her eyes on the parts of Gotham where the more interesting trouble tended to brew. The East Side was a different story—the East Side was Huntress’s turf.

Rook prevented a couple of muggings, then watched over some kids who seemed to be too young to be riding the train alone. When they were safely back to their building, he headed back up Dillon Avenue, jumping from roof to roof whenever he could instead of using the much noisier grappling gun as a mode of transportation.

Of course, he would have much rather been in the Diamond or Fashion Districts looking for Stray, but Spoiler patrolled there sometimes, and since he wasn’t currently connected to the comms he couldn’t find out her location. The East Side would have to suffice until his father let him patrol with him again. Anything was better than sitting at home for another day, listening to Pennyworth prattle on about his theater days or Row—the _other_ Row—talking about Japanese television programs.

He was about an hour into his patrol when he heard the distant sound of a grunts and gasps of pain. He followed the sounds to an alleyway and climbed down a fire escape toward the trouble, nimble and silent as a spider.

Huntress was there. She was fighting five men, and there was somebody with her that Damian didn’t recognize. The teen was tall, black, and he was dressed in a hooded yellow and black coat that was reminiscent of Huntress’s own purple and white tragedy.

They looked like they were handling it—or at least Huntress was mostly handling it while the teen occasionally got in her way. He watched them stumble over each other for a couple of minutes, and when the teen got disoriented and almost punched Huntress again, Damian made his decision. He jumped off the fire escape and descended into the fight, tossing smoke bombs as he fell. They hit the ground just before he did.

“What the—?” one man managed to get out before Damian dropped him with a kick to the face. Two of the others ran toward him through the smoke and he ducked out of the way so they bashed together, falling and moaning over broken noses. Huntress was busy battling a single opponent, the largest of the group, so Damian whirled toward the teen instead. He was just raising his fists to fight the fifth man when Damian swept in and jabbed a kick at the back of the man’s knee. There was a loud crack and he went down with a yell of pain. Even when he was on the ground, the teen still had his fists raised and was staring down at him and Damian like he didn’t understand what had happened.

“Don’t just stand there,” Damian snapped. “Help me restrain them before they run.”

Damian and the teen tied up the four men on the ground while Huntress took down the final one. Damian could have intervened, but she was suddenly fighting a bit dirtier than usual—bashing the man’s head into the wall and so on—so he thought it was best not to get in her way.

By the time the final man was unconscious and tossed on top of the others, Huntress was breathing heavily and bleeding from a cut on her forehead. She felt the wound as she circled Damian. Damian was unsurprised that she did not look happy to see him.

“What are you doing in my neighborhood?” she asked.

“Tt. You’re welcome.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“Hey,” said the teen suddenly.

Damian half turned back toward him.

“You’re Rook, right? Batman’s son?” he said.

Damian turned all the way around to look at him, just enough to keep Huntress in his peripheral vision.

“Yes,” Damian said.

“Oh, cool. I’m, uh—” his eyes flickered toward Huntress, and he coughed. “Uh, Falconer. Huntress’s partner.”

Damian gave him a long, unimpressed look. Then he turned back to Huntress.

“Does my father know that you’ve taken on a sidekick?” Damian asked her.

Huntress’s eyes were obscured by her mask, but Damian could tell she was glowering. Even as Helena Bertinelli, the woman hardly ever seemed to make any other expression.

“Falconer and I are none of your father’s business,” she said.

“If you work in his city, then it’s his business. And something tells me he won’t be pleased that you’ve taken on a partner who has such an obvious lack of talent.”

“Uh,” Falconer said.

Huntress’s lip curled and she said, “Don’t speak about him like that.”

“I watched for a few minutes before I joined the fight and it was obvious right away that you could have taken down those men far more easily without this one tripping over his feet. I do not understand why you are wasting your time,” Damian said.

Behind them, one of the men groaned in pain. Huntress ignored the groaning and took three steps toward Damian, getting right into his face.

“Get out of my neighborhood,” she said.

Damian crossed his arms over his chest and said, “No.”

They stared each other down. Her ridiculous display of bravado did not intimidate him. He was Damian Wayne, son of Batman. He was not and would never be threatened by an unhinged woman with a crossbow.

After an interminable amount of time, Falconer cleared his throat.

“Hey, Huntress? Do you think maybe we should show Rook that thing we found earlier?” he said.

Huntress glanced at her sidekick.

“You know, the graffiti?” Falconer said. “You said we should tell Batman, and well...a Bat is here now.”

Huntress’s body twitched, almost like a shrug but not. She turned away from Damian and started to walk down the alley toward the street.

“Come,” she said, going right past the pile of bleeding men.

Damian resented being summoned in such a manner, but if they knew some information that he could pass along to his father, then he wanted to see what it was. He followed her past the men out to the street. Falconer presumably brought up the rear—Damian did not stop for confirmation.

Huntress took Damian two blocks northeast, through another winding alleyway and almost to the edge of the East Side. He was about to ask if this was her way of trying to escort him out of her neighborhood when she stopped by a dumpster.

“Help me,” she said, and Falconer went to one end, and she grabbed the other, and together they rolled the dumpster out of the way. Rusty wheels squealed as it moved to reveal the dirty wall and graffiti.

Huntress crossed her arms over her chest and said, “This turned up a couple of days ago. Does it mean anything to you?”

The graffiti was an image of a purple bird. It was hastily done and dripping, but undeniable.

It wasn’t _just_ a bird. The artist had taken pains to convey that it was a corvid. As an artist himself, Damian could see that the effort was there. An imbecile would mistake it for a raven, perhaps, but the distinct shape of the beak hinted that it was really a rook.

Also, its head was cut off.

Damian stared at the image. The cold winter wind howled through the alleyway, blowing trash across the concrete and giving him a chill.

When Damian didn’t say anything, Huntress said, “I thought it was a raven at first. But then I thought about your codename.”

Damian tore his eyes away from the bird.

“You think this is a message for me?” he asked.

“Well, yes,” she said.

Damian snorted.

“I understand now why you do not have a reputation for having detective skills,” he muttered.

The woman bristled.

“It’s not like you have any shortage of enemies. I heard you I heard you fought the Sirens’ sons a few days ago.”

“Gotham is covered in graffiti,” Damian said.

“This isn’t a tag used by any of the local gangs.”

“It is not difficult to purchase a can of spray paint.”

“It’s also not the only one,” Falconer said.

Damian looked over at him sharply. He did not miss the way the other boy flinched.

“I saw the same image spray painted on a wall over in Crime Alley when I was on the train yesterday,” Falconer explained.

“But if you aren’t worried, then we’re not worried either,” Huntress said with a shrug. “Tell your father. Or don’t. I don’t care either way. Come on, Falconer.”

Without a goodbye, Huntress brushed past Damian. Damian knew that the teen was lingering, but he didn’t turn around to acknowledge him. Finally Falconer gave up and followed his mentor back the way they came.

When they were gone, Damian wandered around the alleyway. He tried to imagine what his father would look for, if he was there with Damian. But aside from the graffiti, the rest of the alleyway was unremarkable. The buildings backing up to it were mostly apartments, but there were a couple of restaurants and shops. The ground was littered with the usual Gotham fifth, trash and leaves and the remains of a dead rat.

After he was done with his investigation, he stared at the image again.

Perhaps Huntress was correct, and someone was trying to send a message to him. Or maybe there was a new gang in Gotham. Maybe the teenager, Falconer, hadn’t seen what he thought he saw over in Crime Alley. Maybe it was the work of a talentless street artist. Maybe the shape of the beak was an accident. Damian didn’t have enough information to draw any conclusions.

Finally he sniffed contemptuously at the image, annoyed at Huntress and her useless sidekick for thinking he or his father would be interested in it. Without another glance back, Damian pulled out his grappling gun and resumed his solo patrol.

* * *

There was someone banging on the front door.

Groaning, Tim sat up and looked at his clock. It was 2:13 in the afternoon, and he’d only been asleep for about an hour.

The fact that someone was knocking on the door at all was enough to make him alert. This was Harley and Ivy’s house—their latest house in the suburbs—and they never got visitors. The neighborhood was kind of a dump and people seemed to instinctively know that messing with Harley and Ivy was a bad idea, even in their disguises. People usually stayed away.

For a moment he considered ignoring it. Maybe it was the dealer down the street, wanting to fight Jason again. Maybe it was the cops.

Belatedly Tim remembered that it didn’t matter who it was at the door, since no one could touch him anyway. He rolled out of bed and headed to the front of the house, pulling on a sweatshirt over his bare chest as he went. He wouldn’t be able to feel the winter chill outside, but it was better if people saw as little of his skin as possible. The green tint it had since the accident was subtle, but still noticeable to the observant.

When he pulled the door open, the mailman was raising his fist to knock again. A patchy beard peaked out from the mailman’s scarf and his skin was wind burned almost as red as his hair.

“Oh. Your mailbox was full,” he said.

The mailman held out a stack of junk mail. It looked like mostly catalogs, which was unsurprising—Harley had a bad online shopping problem. The mailman was dressed in a jacket and gloves, but Tim was careful not to let his hand brush against him anyway as he accepted the pile.

“Empty it more often, will you?” the mailman said. “Next time I’ll have to take it to the post office and you’ll have to pick it up there.”

“Sure,” Tim said.

Without another word, he stalked off down the walkway, cutting across the grass to his mail truck. It was December, so the grass was mostly dead anyway, but Tim still felt a faint throb of pain in his shoulders and neck as the mailman’s boots crunched over the earth.

Annoyed, Tim bumped the door shut with his hip. He took the mail into the dark kitchen and dumped it on the table. The stack collapsed and a few pieces of mail slipped onto the floor. Tim ignored the mess and tried to rub the pain out of his shoulders as he went back around the kitchen island to look down the hall.

Jay’s door was shut, and so was Harley and Ivy’s. He was still home alone, then. God only knew where Harley went every day, but Ivy would be working late. Jason was probably in class. Tim should’ve been doing homework for his online classes and he could now that he was awake again, but he didn’t feel like it.

He didn’t feel like sleeping anymore either. He didn’t really feel like doing anything.

He was wandering around the kitchen, pointlessly opening cabinets and pacing, when it occurred to him that something didn’t seem...right.

It wasn’t just the pain, which had mostly faded anyway. It was an instinct that poked at his brain, making him feel restless and twitchy.

Maybe it was the mailman. It wasn’t even 2:30 yet, and most days the mail truck didn’t come until around 4. The mail carrier himself had been different too. Their usual mailman wasn’t a Caucasian redhead—he was black. He had an earring in his left ear and he liked to sing Marvin Gaye while he delivered the mail.

Tim went back over to the table and pushed some of the catalogs around with his pointer finger. He rifled through coupons and advertisements, frustrated for some reason, even though he wasn’t totally sure what he was even looking for. But there was nothing out of the ordinary.

Then he remembered that some of the stack had fallen on the floor. He looked under the table. There was a shoe catalog, a furniture catalog, a letter from some charity.

...And a blank postcard.

The back of Tim’s neck prickled as he bent to pick it up. There was a stamp on it, but whoever sent it hadn’t bothered to write anything. He flipped it over.

On the front of the postcard there was an old-timey illustration of a small boy in a field. He was holding a baseball bat. Someone had scribbled Jason’s Jester makeup all over the boy’s face.

Tim turned the postcard over again and confirmed that he definitely hadn’t seen a postmark from the post office, and then he dropped it.

Tim went back to the front door. He yanked it open and ran down the walkway, looking back and forth down the street. One of the neighbors was out on his porch smoking, and some kids were playing basketball in a driveway. A couple of them stopped and stared when they saw Tim standing there, but Tim forgot about them as soon as he looked away.

The redheaded mailman and his truck were already gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Falconer is Duke Thomas, just in case that wasn't obvious enough. He's actually not a bad fighter, Damian just an unreliable narrator :P I am not including Duke's metahuman abilities in this AU because quite frankly, I...don't understand them.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	5. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Where are you?” Tim said.
> 
> “Uh, at a bar near campus? Why?”
> 
> “You need to leave.”

“You’re just going to ignore me, huh?” said the guy.

Jason glanced up from his phone. He'd been so involved in writing his paper he had tuned out the noise of the bar around him, but something about the slimy tone of the guy's voice broke his concentration.

Jason glanced around, pretending to check the football score on the TV across the bar. What he saw in his peripheral vision was a woman—on the short side, dark skinned, cute—having her space crowded by a white bro with a neckbeard. Jason learned everything he needed to know from that one look.

“I’m only here tonight to hang out with my friends and I don’t want to be rude—”

“We don’t have to hang out tonight. If you give me your number we can text and get to know each other,” he said.

Jason picked up his beer bottle and took a sip.

“Sorry, but—”

“You have a boyfriend or something?” he said.

“I think I’m just going to head back to my friends—”

“Weren’t you going to get a drink though? I can get you something,” he said.

Irritation settled over Jason’s skin like a physical itch. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back, breathed deep, and had to roll the tension out of his shoulders.

“I can pay for my own—”

“I’ll order you something and while you wait you can talk to me and see I’m a good guy.”

Jason sighed and put his phone into the back pocket of his jeans. Before the woman could try to wriggle out of the conversation yet again, he walked around her and got between her and the neckbeard.

The guy blinked up at Jason, obviously confused and annoyed, but there was a little apprehension there, too—Jason could see it in his eyes. He crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at the guy. He was even uglier now that Jason was looking at him directly.

“She’s not interested,” Jason told him.

The guy narrowed his eyes.

“Who are you?” the neckbeard asked.

“No one,” Jason said.

“Are you her boyfriend?”

Honestly, it was like speaking to a sociopathic child.

“She shouldn’t have to have a boyfriend in order for you to be convinced to leave her alone,” Jason said.

“If she’s not into me like that she can just say so,” the neckbeard said.

“I’m sure she would if you would actually let her finish a sentence.”

Hilariously, the neckbeard sized Jason up like he was thinking about starting a fight. He took in the muscles and the height and the scars criss-crossing Jason’s forearms, and when he looked back up at Jason’s face, Jason smiled, all teeth.

There was a long pause while the guy’s survival instincts battled for dominance over his stupidity. Jason wondered what he would do if he knew that Jason fought Batman less than a week ago. Shit himself, probably.

Finally the neckbeard said, “Whatever man.” Then he made his first smart choice of the evening and walked away. Jason heard him mutter something vulgar under his breath about Jason and the woman before he returned to his crowd of equally slimy looking friends.

A bar fight would have really brightened up Jason's day, but he had a research paper to finish, so he ignored it. This time.

Jason uncrossed his arms and went back to his stool on the other side of the woman. She hadn’t bailed while Jason was arguing with the neckbeard, but he didn’t look at her or speak to her. Sometimes that just freaked women out all over again, because then they thought he wanted something from them too.

So Jason took a sip of his beer, got his phone back out, and kept writing his paper.

The woman didn’t leave. The bartender finally made his way over to take her order. She told him what he wanted and when he left to make her drink, she lingered. Jason drank his beer and minded his own business.

“I could’ve handled him on my own,” she said.

Jason didn’t look up from his phone. He was in the middle of a paragraph about dialogue in _The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders_ and found it upsetting that his train of thought kept getting interrupted.

“That’s good. Gotham is a dumpster fire,” he said.

She didn’t say anything, and the silence stretched out until the bartender came back with a cranberry vodka. He didn’t look up from his writing, but somehow he sensed that she still hadn’t gone back to her friends.

“Am I bothering you?” she asked.

“Not really,” he said.

“Then can I ask what you’re writing?”

“A paper for my Poetics class,” he said.

“You’re drinking while you’re writing a paper? Like, for college?”

“Multi-tasking. I write my best arguments when I’m a little drunk,” Jason said. Then he finally did look up from his phone and shoot her a grin, and damn, she was cute. She had an awesome fauxhawk and an adorably tiny heart-shaped face.

“Um, so, Poetics? What kind of class is that?” she asked.

“Oh,” Jason said, shaking his head, “it’s just a literature class, basically. My professor is kind of a douchebag so she calls it Poetics.”

The woman smirked and said, “Ah. I thought you were going to say it was about like, sonnets and limericks or something. But I’m studying biochem so don’t judge me for not knowing that off the top of my head. I pretty much just took the required English classes and never looked back.”

“That’s fair,” Jason said. “I pretty much took the three required science courses and then I never looked back. Don’t quiz me about protons because I don’t remember shit.”

She laughed. It was a beautiful sound—melodic.

He was about to ask her something else when his phone started vibrating in his hand. When he looked down at it, he saw the picture of Tim’s annoyed face on the screen.

The woman saw it too.

“Do you need to get that?” she asked.

“Nah, that’s just my brother. I can call him back later,” Jason said, rejecting the call and setting the phone back down next to his drink.

He smiled, leaning in a little towards her. “So, biochemistry? Why did you—” his phone started buzzing again. It was just loud enough that the woman could hear it too and Jason sighed.

“Are you sure you don’t need to get it?” she asked.

Jason shot her a weary look and said, “Sorry, hold on.”

He picked up the phone and hit the green button. He didn’t bother with a greeting.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“ _Where are you?_ ” Tim said.

“Uh, at a bar near campus? Why?”

“ _You need to leave._ ”

Jason glanced around the bar. It was a small place, old and a little dingy but more relaxed than some of the other bars close to his campus. It was definitely nicer and safer compared to some of the other places around Gotham where he hung out on the weekends. The guys at the table with the neckbeard were pointedly ignoring him, and three girls at a different table were eyeing him curiously, but he didn’t see anybody that seemed particularly dangerous. This wasn’t the kind of place Batman would...clean out.

“What for?” Jason asked.

“ _Something weird showed up at the house and I think you might be in danger._ ”

“What?” Jason said. “What was it?”

“ _I’ll text you an address. Meet me there in an hour. Don’t be followed._ ”

“Wait—”

Tim hung up before Jason could get an explanation. He swore under his breath and redialed right away, but it went directly to voicemail.

“Something wrong?” the woman asked, frowning.

“Uh,” Jason said.

A text popped up on the screen. Jason looked at the address and swore again. Tim wanted him to go all the way across Gotham.

“I think I need to go. My brother’s freaking out about something,” Jason said.

“Oh,” said the girl. “Well, ok. It was nice meeting you…”

She raised her eyebrows expectantly. Jason smiled down at her and said, “Seth.”

“Nice to meet you, Seth. I’m Nanette,” she said.

She held out the hand that wasn’t holding a drink, and Jason shook it.

“My friends and I were thinking this might be a fun place to come next weekend. Maybe I’ll see you around again sometime, Seth,” Nanette said, smiling.

Without another word, she went back to the table to see her friends.

“Yeah,” Jason said, watching her go. “Maybe.”

He watched out of the corner of his eye to make sure she made it safely to her friends while he paid his tab, and then he left.

* * *

Jason was already inside the house when Dick climbed in the window.

“You could’ve used the door,” Jason said, not looking up from his phone. “It was unlocked.”

Dick ignored him. He looked around at the brownstone as he jumped down onto the floor. The front room he'd entered was empty—no furniture at all, but no trash either, and it smelled like fresh paint. Jason’s phone screen was the only source of light in the dark.

“So you got summoned too, huh?” Dick asked him.

Jason snorted and said, “Yeah and he wouldn’t tell me what the hell for either.”

Dick nodded and said, “Same. And the house?”

Dick knew that Tim, Jason, Harley, and Ivy had a lot of hideouts, but this wasn’t one that he was familiar with. It was all the way over on the Upper West Side, far outside of their usual neighborhoods, and inconvenient to get to in a pinch.

“Fuck if I know,” Jason said, shaking his head. “I would ask him about it, but he’s not even here.”

“Actually he is. He’s out back in the yard. I saw him as I was coming in, but he looked busy so I didn’t bother him,” Dick said.

“He—?”

Jason stopped short and rolled his eyes. He got up and headed to the kitchen. He went straight to the window, pulling the blinds down to look out into the backyard. Dick followed, looking over Jason’s shoulder.

The short winter afternoon had turned into a cloudless evening, and the moon was just bright enough that they were able to see Tim, who was sitting on the ground under the bare branches of a tree. He was fully dressed for a change, in a coat and gloves and everything. His feet were still bare though, and he had his knees hugged to his chest so they were pressed flat into the ground.

Jason snorted. 

“What’s he doing?” Dick asked.

“Talking to trees or something. How should I know?”

Jason went over to the back door and yanked it open.

“Hey!” Jason said.

Tim jerked around and looked up at them, eyes wide.

“I didn’t trek all the way over to the other side of Gotham to sit around watching you do weirdo plant boy stuff. Get in here.”

Jason shut the back door and went back through the kitchen to the front room. Dick followed him.

“You know, you should really be nicer to him. He spends a lot of time alone and the least you can do is not pick fights,” Dick said.

Jason just laughed.

“I was actually having an ok night until he called and summoned me like a dog. Forgive me if I'm not in the mood for Timothy Drake's melodramatics.”

Tim walked into the house in the middle of this tirade, but didn’t say anything in defense of himself. He shut the back door and dropped his shoes in the middle of the kitchen.

“Hey Tim,” Dick said, smiling encouragingly. “What’s going on?”

Tim went over to the wall and flipped a switch. The light came on and Dick and Jason blinked in the sudden brightness.

“Huh, electricity. Fancy,” Dick said. He stopped smiling when he saw the grim look on Tim’s face.

“What’s so important that it couldn’t be shared in a text?” Jason asked.

“I found something you need to see,” Tim said.

Tim came over to them and reached into his back pocket with one of his gloved hands. He pulled out a small piece of paper and held it out to them, but Jason snatched it before Dick could.

Dick only got a glimpse of it, but he was pretty sure it was a postcard. The back looked blank, but as Jason examined the front, his blandly annoyed expression immediately crystalized into something more focused.

“What the fuck?” Jason said.

“What is it?” Dick asked.

Jason held it out and Dick took it from him, flipping it right side up.

There was an old painting of a boy holding a baseball bat on the front of the postcard. The art style reminded Dick of a poor man’s Norman Rockwell, but the painting wasn’t anything famous enough for him to know by name. Jason’s old red, white, and gold Jester makeup had been scribbled over the boy’s face.

“Shit,” Dick said.

He flipped it over and took another look at the back, even though he already knew it was blank. No message, but there was a stamp.

“This stamp is only worth four cents,” Dick said.

“And there’s no postmark,” Tim said.

Tim was right—there wasn’t.

“Where did you find this?” Dick asked him.

The whole story came spilling out of Tim in a panicked jumble. He paced back and forth across the room as he talked, and Dick caught something about a redhead, Marvin Gaye, and a mail truck, but Tim was talking too fast and he wasn’t making any sense.

“Whoa, whoa, Tim—” Jason said, but Tim kept talking right over him.

“—so I started going through the mail and that postcard was in there and when I went outside to look the mailman was gone.”

“So the postcard was in the mailbox?” Jason said.

“No, no, you’re not—” Tim huffed and pointed at the postcard. “There’s no postmark, so it didn’t go through the post office. And the guy who usually delivers the mail is a completely different guy than the guy who handed me the stack. And then once I thought about it and started going through the other things that he handed me I realized that everything in there was pretty accurate, almost like somebody knew what we would have in the mail—”

“ _Tim_ ,” Dick said, using his sternest voice.

Tim jerked, but Dick’s tone did seem to snap Tim out of his panic somehow. He took a deep breath, and when he looked back up at Dick again, Dick could tell that he was more settled.

“Tell us what happened, from the beginning. Slower this time,” Dick said.

Tim went back over the story again, just like Dick asked. This time Dick could actually follow what he was saying.

“So you think that the guy who delivered the postcard wasn’t a real mailman,” Jason said.

“Yes,” Tim said.

Jason snorted and said, “No offense Timbo, but that sounds a little far-fetched.”

“Everyday around 4:15 our usual mailman drives around the neighborhood. I hear him singing. I remember, because he likes Marvin Gaye and my mom liked his music too. This other guy, whoever he was, delivered the mail just after 2 and when I went back outside to look for his truck, it was gone. There’s no way he could’ve delivered the mail to the whole neighborhood that fast.”

There was a pause, but Jason shook his head and said, “No, sorry, I don’t buy it.”

“I’m not denying that it’s far-fetched, but there really isn’t any other explanation. I just wish it hadn’t taken me so long to figure it out, because then I might’ve had a chance of catching the guy before he drove off. I spent some time looking for him, but I can only see so far with the green. He must have taken off right away, which was also worrying, because then maybe he knew some stuff about me too—”

“I think we’re getting a little off track,” Dick said. “The mailman part is weird, but the more important question we should be asking is who we think sent the postcard in the first place. I’m guessing the mailman didn’t look familiar?”

“No, not at all,” Tim said.

“It’s obvious who sent it,” Jason said.

Dick and Tim looked at him.

Seeing their baffled faces, Jason shrugged and said, “Isn’t it? It’s got to be the kid.”

Dick was about to ask, “Who?” but Tim said, “Wait. You’re not talking about Batboy?”

For some reason Dick felt an immediate impulse to deny it...but actually, the more he thought about it, the more it kind of made sense.  

“He goes by Rook now. What makes you think it’s him?” Dick asked.

Jason shrugged and said,“Well, Harley says that Rook hasn’t been seen with Batman for days now, not since we fought him. If he’s got nothing better to do then why not figure out where we live and send something to mess with us?”

Tim shook his head.

“No, no, no,” he said, and shook it again. “No, that’s not it. It’s not Rook, it can’t be.”

Jason rolled his eyes and said, “Ok then, what’s your theory?”

“I don’t have one yet,” Tim said.

“So why are you shitting on mine?”

“Because the kid’s not that subtle. Remember what happened to Riddler?” Tim asked.

Everybody remembered what happened to Riddler. Not long after Batman finally made the kid a Bat, they ran into Riddler. Nygma had set a trap and used Rook’s peril as a way to distract Batman so he could get away. Nygma hadn’t realized how poorly the kid would react to being used as a distraction though, and Rook returned for a rematch, hungry for blood. Riddler would be dead now if Batman hadn’t shown up when he did.

Rook couldn’t be underestimated just because he was a kid, and it was a really bad idea to think of him as a way to get to Batman.

...Which was, Dick realized, exactly what he had done the other night.

It was not a comfortable thought.

“This isn’t Rook’s M.O. He’s a hothead. We saw that for ourselves in the department store the other night. He doesn’t back down from a fight, even if he knows he’s outmatched. If he wanted to get back at us for what happened he would just find his sword and come after us himself. Whoever did this”—Tim grabbed the postcard out of Dick’s hand and waved it in front of them—“wasn’t out for revenge.”

“Then what did they want?” Jason asked.

“They wanted us to rattle us,” Tim said.

Jason raised his eyebrows. “Well, you certainly seem rattled.”

“You would be too if you were at the house when it happened,” Tim snapped.

Jason was about to say something else but Dick shot him a look and, unbelievably, he actually shut his mouth.

“Anyway, if it was Rook who sent it, then why Jason?” Tim said.

“What do you mean?” Dick asked.

“He hardly fought Jack of Clubs the other night. If he’s going to be pissed at somebody, it wouldn’t be him. It would be you.” He gave Dick a significant look.

“Maybe he doesn’t know where Dick lives?” Jason said.

“So then why not me? I fought him for longer than you did. Why would he single you out of the three of us?” Tim asked.

“Maybe he only had the one postcard,” Jason said, but then he frowned, and Dick could tell that Tim was slowly winning this argument. Rook was a convenient answer, the easy one, but Tim was right that it didn’t sound like something he would do.

“Have you told Harley and Ivy about this yet?” Dick asked Tim.

Tim sighed and seemed to deflate a little.

“Yeah, I talked to Ivy right away and sent her some pictures of the postcard. She was going to come here too but Harley’s phone is going straight to voicemail again and she had to go out to look for her instead. She said she’ll head here as soon as she finds Harley and then we’ll start working on figuring out who sent the card.”

“In the meantime, you can’t go back to your house in the suburbs,” Dick told both of them.

Jason said, “No, you think?”

“Jason and I can stay here. I just found this place today, no one should know about it,” Tim said.

“What about the owners?” Dick asked.

“There aren’t any, not at the moment. Foreclosure,” Tim said.

“What about you?” Jason asked Dick. “You taking off?”

It wasn’t like Dick had nothing to do, and he wasn’t the one being targeted, at least as far as he knew. He’d been planning on robbing a gallery over in the City Hall District just after midnight and still had some prep to take care of.

But if he was being completely honest with himself, thinking about that postcard rattled him too. Whoever sent the card knew exactly how to get under their skin.

“I think I’ll stay. At least until Ivy gets here,” Dick said.

“Really?” Jason said. “What for?”

“Babysitting. Somebody has to make sure you two don’t run off to do something dumb,” Dick told him.  

Jason muttered something vulgar under his breath, but Dick didn’t miss the how Tim’s shoulders slumped in relief, and Jason, for all of his blustering, didn’t tell Dick to go. 

* * *

After the nightly meeting, Stephanie put her feet up on the briefing table—because it was comfortable, yes, but also because it drove Bruce crazy.

Technically, the briefing was over. Harper and Alfred were going to go take a look at some weapon Cass found while Cass and Bruce headed to the computer to continue going over a Black Mask case. Stephanie, on the other hand, had no special projects from Bruce. She didn’t have any projects or cases, period, not even ones she had given herself.

This was fine though, because at the moment she didn’t really have any energy to work on anything anyway. Being the family failure had its perks—like extra downtime. She was thinking about taking a quick power nap before patrol when she spotted Damian’s shoulder poking out from behind a stalagmite.

“Hey Rookie,” Stephanie said.

The bit of his shoulder disappeared behind the rock, and Stephanie grinned.

“I know you’re there. You might as well come out,” she said.

For a minute Damian didn’t move. Stephanie was wondering if she was going to have to go pull him out from behind the stalagmite when, finally, he walked around it. He came over to the other side of the table and crossed his arms over his chest.

He was wearing a dark grey turtleneck sweater, black pants, and black shoes. It was a classic Bruce Wayne look, because damn if the kid didn't have some serious daddy issues. She didn't mention it, though, because getting herself stabbed right before patrol would be inconvenient.

“I have asked you not to call me by that name several times,” he said.

Stephanie ignored him. He was the one who chose the codename Rook, so in a way he’d kind of done it to himself.

“You’re spending an awful lot of time lurking down here for someone who can’t patrol,” she said.

Damian glared up at her.

“I still have training. I would be a poor son of Batman if I neglected it just because of a temporary suspension,” he said.

Stephanie shrugged. “If you say so.”

“Now if you will excuse me, I would rather not waste my time—”

“I know you’ve been sneaking out,” Stephanie said.

She didn’t miss the lightning fast glance Damian shot toward the computer. Cass and Bruce were way too far away to hear their conversation, though, and the humming server made some convenient white noise.

“I have no idea what you are talking about, Brown. As usual.”

He sounded pretty convincing, but Stephanie still told him, “And I don’t believe you.”

For a long moment Stephanie and Damian gazed at each other, as assessing as poker players in the middle of a game. The kid was good. And yeah, maybe Stephanie didn’t technically have proof that Damian was sneaking out, but she had a sixth sense about these things. Rule breaking was her forté, her true passion. And she would have bet every single one of her shurikens that Damian was still patrolling behind Bruce’s back.

It wasn’t her business if he was. She wasn’t on anybody’s side—definitely not Bruce’s, but not Damian’s either. She didn’t know if what he’d done the other night was really bad enough to merit getting grounded from patrol but honestly, she didn’t care.

So after a while she smiled at him and said, “Relax, Damian, I’m not going to tattle on you. Sneaking out to go patrol after Bruce has told you not to is basically a right of passage. I know I did it plenty of times, so I have no right to judge. But it is my sisterly duty to remind you that you shouldn’t be out on the streets alone.”

“Tt. You are not my sister,” he said.

“You know what I mean.”

“I do not. You are not a blood relation, and nor did my father adopt you. Therefore you are not my sister and have no business claiming to have any sort of sisterly duties at all,” he said.

This was all technically true. Stephanie had a mom out there somewhere, although she and Stephanie didn’t talk anymore. Stephanie’s dad, of course, was dead. Even if Bruce did want to adopt her—which was an absurd notion—she was almost eighteen, so there would be no point.

But she _did_ live in Wayne Manor, and she ate breakfast in the same room as Damian every morning. She had helped him wash Titus that one time, and she brought him Gatorade when he was sick last August. So in a lot of ways she kind of was like his sister. A real sister wouldn’t let him patrol alone.

So Stephanie leveled a deadly serious look at him and said, “Tonight you should come with me instead of going out by yourself. I know you’d rather have Cass, but she’d rat you out to Bruce and I won’t. You’re pretty much stuck with me whether you like it or not.”

Damian’s lip curled with disgust.

“Of all of my father’s partners, I have never understood why he wasted his time with you. If you have managed to stay alive by the time that I inherit my father’s cowl then you will be the first person who I banish from the cave,” he said.

Stephanie frowned and cocked her head at him.

“Inherit his cowl?” she said.

“Gotham needs Batman. As his only blood child, and his only son, it is only natural that I should be the one to become Batman when he can no longer fulfill the role,” Damian said.

Stephanie stared at him for a moment.

Then she laughed. It was probably a bad idea, but she couldn’t help it.

Damian was glaring at her when she stopped. His body was rigid with fury, his eyes smoldering.

“I do not understand what is so humorous,” he said.

“Dude.”

Stephanie looked over her shoulder to check on Cass and Bruce across the cave. They were still discussing the Black Mask case, and Cass was saying something. Bruce was waiting, silent and attentive, for her to work her way through her thought.

It was a magnanimous show of patience that had never been extended to Stephanie. She couldn’t even think of a time Bruce looked at her the whole time she was explaining something. Usually he was way too busy for that. But Cass, no. Cass had his full attention.

Stephanie turned back to Damian and said, “If anybody’s taking the cowl, it’s Cass.”

Damian looked mystified.

“That’s absurd,” he said.

“Why?”

“Because she is a woman. She cannot be Batman. Perhaps she could inherit Batwoman’s cowl instead, if she was tired of being Black Bat.”

“Batwoman doesn’t work with a partner, and anyway, we work for Batman, not her. You need to get a clue,” Stephanie said, jerking a thumb in the direction of the computer. “I mean, have you looked at their suits? Batman made her that suit, you know.”

Damian looked across the cave toward Bruce and Cass. They were both wearing matte black suits that had the yellow outline of the Bat symbol on the chest. Same black capes, and their utility belts were the same down to the number of pouches. The only differences were that Cass wore a domino, not a cowl, and her suit had the Batgirl symbol instead of the Batman symbol. Otherwise the suits were identical.

When Stephanie looked back over at Damian, he was eyeing Cass in a way Stephanie didn’t like. Had he really never noticed?

“I have no idea what I you think I am supposed to see,” he said, but his poker face had slipped too much for it to be anything but an obvious lie.

“She’s basically Batman already,” Stephanie told him. “Sometimes at night it’s too dark to see her properly, and even though she’s so much smaller than him, people think she’s Batman anyway.”

Damian looked to her sharply and said, “You’re lying.”

“Face it, kid,” Stephanie said. “She may be a girl and she’s not a biological kid like you, but she’s the favorite.”

Without another word, Damian turned and left.

“Hey!” Stephanie said.

Damian didn’t turn around. She watched him walk up the steps toward the elevator.

“Don’t forget what we talked about!” she yelled after him. “I’ll be watching you!”

When he was gone, Stephanie snorted. Then she turned around again to watch Cass and Bruce.

Four years ago, Bruce had taken Stephanie on as Batgirl out of some misguided sense of duty. It wasn’t that long after Carrie died, and he hadn’t wanted a new partner. He only made Stephanie Batgirl because he was convinced she was going to get herself killed if he didn’t intervene. And yeah, Stephanie knew that he’d been grieving then and didn’t mean a lot of the things he’d done and said, but it didn’t make her feel better.

Sometimes Stephanie wished he hadn’t bothered taking her under his wing. Maybe her life would be great if he’d ignored Spoiler, if he’d never given her the Batgirl symbol. Maybe if he hadn’t, her dad would still be alive. Maybe she wouldn’t have killed him.

She could drive herself crazy with so many maybes.

Stephanie liked Cass a lot. She couldn’t help it—nobody could. But even the fog of not feeling and not thinking about things that had settled over her mind ever since she killed her dad wasn’t enough to obscure the knowledge that Stephanie would never be her. Cass was beloved—she was the best. Nothing Stephanie had ever done could compare, and never would.

Down by the computer, Cass said something and Bruce actually smiled.

Stephanie finally had to look away. Sliding her boots off the briefing table, she got up to go make sure Damian wasn’t sneaking out a window without her. Somebody needed to look after the kid, and it wasn’t like she had anything better to do. The family failures had to stick together.


	6. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Spoiler!” he yelled. “Release me this instant!”
> 
> He heard footsteps, and then large purple boots entered his frame of vision. He looked up to her hooded face, glaring.
> 
> “What did I say about going out to patrol without me?” she asked.

Moving would have been a lot easier if Harley wasn’t clinging to Jason’s back like some kind of monkey.

“Harley, please,” he said. “I can’t lift the heavy shit with you hanging on to me like this.”

Her arms and legs tightened around his torso, squeezing the air out of his lungs.

“No!” she said. “I’ll kill them! Whoever it is, I’ll find ‘em and kill them for threatening my Little Jay!"

“I’m fine,” Jason said.

“Whoever thinks they can mess with you has no idea who’s coming for them!” she said.

Then she burst into tears.

Jason closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Harley had been like this ever since Ivy found her and brought her back to Jason—swinging wildly between inconsolable and furious, ready to kill someone one minute, blubbering the next. She didn’t want to let him go and wasn’t helping move into the new safe house either.

Jason plus attached sobbing Harley went back to the pile of boxes in the den. He grunted when he bent to pick one up. On the way back to his room, he saw Ivy in the master bedroom. She was talking quietly on the phone, but when she saw Jason watching down the hall she shut the door. 

Ivy hadn’t offered to help Jason peal her wife off his back yet and somehow he didn’t think that such an offer was forthcoming.

Tim wasn’t being helpful either. There was a mass of vines growing in the hallway in front of his room, blocking off the entrance. Jason carefully stepped over them on his way down the hall and told Harley, “You’re overreacting. As usual. It’s just a postcard. It’s probably just some asshole trying to fuck with my head.”

Harley’s nails dug into Jason’s skin. “I’ll kill them!”

Jason winced as he brought the box into his room. He put the box down on the floor, and then  grabbed Harley’s arms, tried to pry her nails out of his shoulders. She scrambled up his back and grabbed the top of his head.

“Harley!” he said.

“No, I wanna stay with you! I’m gonna protect you!” she said.

_Enough_ , he thought. He went to his cot and leaned over, and when she started to slip, he used gravity to his advantage and pushed her the rest of the way off. The cot squeaked when she landed on it.

“Jay!” she said. She gave him a betrayed look, but it had been a long time since Jason was susceptible to those puppy dog eyes.

“No,” he said, pointing at her. “Help Ivy and me with the boxes or stay here.”

Harley pouted and rolled over on the cot. He sighed when she grabbed his blanket and pushed her face into it. There was going to be white makeup all over it now, and that shit was impossible to clean off.

Oh well. Her pouting on his cot and getting makeup all over everything was better than her piggybacking all over the apartment while he tried to help Ivy unpack.

Jason went back to the den for another box, thinking he’d unpack some of Ivy’s lab stuff in the kitchen, and then maybe by the time he headed back to his room Harley would be asleep. She had to crash sometime. Jason was pretty sure she’d been up for almost two days straight, and even her seemingly boundless reserves of energy had a cap.

When he got to the kitchen, Ivy had reemerged from the master bedroom and was unpacking in the kitchen—if a refrigerator, a counter with a sink, and a microwave could be considered a kitchen. She smirked at him when she saw he’d finally lost Harley.

“You could’ve removed her if you wanted,” Jason said.

“What makes you think she’ll do anything I say?” Ivy asked.

Jason glared at her and opened the box.

For a little while they unpacked in companionable silence. Jason had always liked Ivy. Ivy grounded Harley, gave her some stability. She was the smartest person Jason knew and could even get Tim to listen to her. Also, she wasn’t at all nervous about tearing a guy in two for looking at her the wrong way, and Jason had to respect that.

“I know you’re not happy about this, and neither am I,” Ivy said, apropos of nothing, “but until we get to the bottom of whoever sent that card we don’t have a whole lot of options.”

“It’s fine,” Jason said, looking around the dumpy apartment. “It’s just temporary anyway, until we find a better place.”

“Yes,” Ivy said. “Losing the house was unfortunate, but it could have been worse.”

Jason grunted in response.

Truthfully, he’d been getting sick of living in the suburbs anyway. He never told anybody, but lately he'd been entertaining the idea of moving back into the city. In all of his imagined scenarios, however, he always moved back to the city alone. He thought he’d try to find his own place, near campus maybe. Get a break from other people.

It wasn’t like he hated them. Harley, Ivy, and Tim were the closest thing he had to a family, and he would do anything for them, but sometimes it was all too much. Ivy and Tim could be intense sometimes, and of course there was Harley’s...Harleyness. He'd wanted a break from the chaos.

Now the chaos was because of him. Everyone was having to uproot their lives because some jackass thought it would be funny to taunt him. He was going to have to start over. Again. The others would have to start over. Again.

And it was his fault. Jason wasn’t used to the chaos being his fault.

“The apartment is, of course, temporary,” Ivy said.

Jason heard her unspoken “but.”

“Can we not talk about this now?” Jason asked.

“I know Harley and I are always saying there’s only one rule around here, but you do know that you can’t go back to your classes, right? If someone found the house, then they most likely know who Seth Richardson is too,” Ivy said.

Of course he knew it, but he’d been hoping no one would be gauche enough to say it out loud.

Jason shrugged and said, “It’s fine. College was getting old anyway. All those dickhead professors arguing with each other about bullshit that doesn’t matter and whiny little fuckers in my classes who have no idea how good they have it.”

Ivy shot him a pitying look.

“I know you loved it,” she said.

“I don’t have to go to college to love literature. It’s not like I was going to be able to find something to do with my degree anyway. College is a scam,” he said.

Ivy reached out and put a hand on Jason’s arm. He felt her featherlight touch for an instant, then he took a step away.

He was sick of talking about it. It was past time since he got realistic anyway. He was Jason Todd, Harley Quinn’s adopted son. Every day on campus had been playing a game of would he or would he not get recognized by someone. He had a record. He was a murderer, even if he’d never been formally charged for the deaths—he knew what he’d done, and so did the Bat.

College was a fantasy, but now the fantasy was over. He wasn’t going to cry over something that hadn’t been real to start with.

He had to figure out what he was going to do for real. There weren’t a whole lot of options for someone like him, but he could figure something out.

Jason returned to the den to get another box. As he passed the hallway on his way back to the kitchen, he saw the dark growth of roots blocking Tim’s doorway again.

“What the hell is Tim doing all shut up in his room? Couldn’t you, you know”—Jason waved his hand at the mass of vines in front of his doorway—“get rid of all that and make him come out here to help?”

Ivy looked down the hallway to Tim’s room and then back up at Jason, green eyes wide and uncomprehending for a moment.

“Oh, he’s not here,” she said.

Jason almost dropped the box he was holding.

“What? Where is he?”

“He went out. To investigate the postcard, I assume,” Ivy said.

“And you didn’t, I don’t know, try to stop him?” Jason asked.

“He didn’t ask if he could go. He snuck out.”

“I thought you two had some kind of mental thing where you know what the other is doing,” he said.

“He made a decoy of himself. It’s a pretty good one, but it didn’t fool me for very long.”

Jason pointed at Tim’s door and said, “You mean there’s like a plant clone of him in there?”

“Well, not a clone. It’s a large plant that has been taught think like Tim in particular ways,” Ivy said.

Jason shuddered.

“Ok, I take it back. Do not move those vines because I do not want to see it,” he said.

Ivy shrugged.

“Aren’t you going to go out and get him?” Jason asked.

“I would if I knew where he was,” Ivy said.

She saw that Jason was about to explode and said, “Jason, I called him. He’s fine. He’s hidden.”

“You should go look for him right now,” Jason said.

“I can’t.”

“Why?” he demanded.

“Because I’m watching you,” she said, and took a box of plants down the hall to her and Harley’s room.

* * *

Damian was about to swing over into the Diamond District when he felt something tightening around his ankles.

“Pay attention, Rookie!” Brown yelled.

There was a sharp jerk and Damian’s feet were yanked out from under him. He threw up his arms so that his face didn’t smack into the gravel.

Brown cackled.

“Spoiler!” he yelled. “Release me this instant!”

He heard footsteps, and then large purple boots entered his frame of vision. He looked up to her hooded face, glaring.

“What did I say about going out to patrol without me?” she asked.

“I did not ask for nor do I want your assistance,” he said.

“You lost me last night, but I wasn’t about to let it happen twice,” she said, smirking down at him. “Also, how on earth did I drop you like that? No offense, kid, but I think you’re losing your edge.”

This was more than Damian could take. His sight narrowed in on Spoiler, and everything everything else blocked out by the rage. He pulled a shuriken out of his utility belt and sat up to saw through the rope around his ankles. As soon as the rope snapped and he was free, he jumped to his feet and advanced on her.

“Whoa,” Brown said. She backed up, her hands raised. “Don’t attack me. I’ll tell your dad.”

Damian ran at her, but she was faster than he was anticipating. She rolled out of the way.

“Come on, all I did was knock you off your feet,” she said. “You can’t kill me for that.”

Her hood covered the lower half of her face, but somehow he could tell she was smiling. She wasn’t taking the fight seriously—she wasn’t taking _him_ seriously—and all of the indignities he’d suffered since he’d fought the Sirens’ useless sons were suddenly boiling over. He was Damian Wayne, son of Batman and Talia al Ghul, grandson of Ra’s al Ghul. She was Stephanie Brown, the daughter of a two-bit con who would never have ranked among his father's greatest villains. She _would_ take him seriously.

She must have been able to see it on his face, because her eyes widened.

“Oh, crap,” she said.  “Well, if you do gut me, just don’t get my face. I want to look good in my coffin.”

Damian yelled a battle cry and lunged for her. She raised her gauntlets to fend off his attack.

But then, down below, tired squealed and there was a different kind of scream—a scream of fear. Damian immediately stopped and turned, looking toward the sound.

“Yikes. Let’s pause this and get back to it later,” Brown said. She walked around him to the edge of the building and jumped off.

For a moment, Damian could only stare at the edge of the roof where she’d disappeared. She hadn’t even had her grappling gun in her hand. If his father saw her do something like that he would be furious.

When he’d recovered from the shock, he ran to the edge of the roof. As soon as he reached it, he heard the crack of her grappling gun.

In the alleyway behind the building, two men wearing skull masks were trying to herd a small boy into the back of van. One of them had the boy by the arm and was pulling on him while the other was following behind. The one bringing up the rear had a handgun.

Brown did not wait for him.

She slammed into the man holding the handgun as she swung down, knocking him into the hard marble exterior of the nearest building. He lost his weapon and slumped onto the concrete. By the time the second masked man turned and realized what was happening, Brown was already on her feet and advancing on him.

The small boy got shoved out of the way and the second man shouted something Damian was too far away to hear. Brown grabbed his arm and brought a fist down on his wrist, shattering it. He howled with pain when she squeezed on the broken bone and his knees buckled. Brown slammed her knee up into his face as he came down.

When she let go, he crumpled to the ground like a dropped doll. The first man still hadn’t gotten up. As quick as that, it was over. The two men were down, and it had been brutal, efficient...

...and Damian hadn’t even left the rooftop yet.

Of course, everything that Brown had said about Cassandra Cain being his father’s favorite was ridiculous. But one thing was clear: he had not paid enough attention to the women who his father trained. He had dismissed them utterly, thinking they were mere irritants, and then he had ignored them when they offered to train or patrol with him, assuming that it would be a waste of his time.

This was, perhaps, a miscalculation on his part.

When he dropped down to the pavement near Brown, she was crouched on the ground and the small boy was sobbing into her shoulder.

“What took you so long?” she said, glaring at Damian.

Damian didn’t say anything. Instead he went over to the two men in the skull masks. He went to the man who had been slammed into the wall first, then the man with the broken wrist. He placed two fingers on both of their necks and checked for a pulse.

“Relax, I didn’t kill them. Do I look new?” Brown asked. The boy in her arms sobbed harder, and she shushed him, saying, “Hey, it’s ok, you’re safe now. The bad men are going to jail. What’s your name, sweet pea?”

His name was David, and Damian and Brown managed to get the story out of him in panicked increments. He’d been walking home from playing basketball with his friends when the two men in the van drove up and tried to grab him. He wasn’t supposed to walk home alone, but he’d done it before and nothing bad had ever happened. This time he wasn’t so lucky.

By the time David was reunited with his father and Brown had delivered the two men in the skull masks to the police, over an hour had passed.

Damian followed Brown farther into the Diamond District afterwards. She seemed inordinately proud of herself.

“We did a good thing tonight, Rookie! David’s going home with his dad tonight, and two creeps are going to jail,” she said.

“Tt. Perhaps now the boy will understand why his father has a rule about traveling through Gotham alone,” Damian said.

“Hey,” she snapped. “In this house we don’t blame the victim. It’s not David’s fault Gotham is the fifth circle of hell.”

Damian sniffed, but didn’t say anything further on the subject.

He was only using her presence so that he could get farther into the Diamond District anyway. Brown was annoying, but until his father allowed him to resume patrolling, he had a better chance of achieving his goal of finding and catching Stray with her around. She was a free agent; she wouldn’t accept one of Oracle’s dominoes with their attached tech and she didn’t take cases from his father. Apparently she did not intend to tell Batman that he was still going out on patrol either. He had no better option.

It was problematic, then, that Brown took Damian to a skyscrape, found a ledge, sat down on top of a gargoyle, and then refused to move.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Waiting,” she said.

“For what?”

“For something to happen. Go, find a gargoyle. Take a seat.”

She swung her legs back and forth over the expanse below them and began to hum a song.

Damian did not go sit on a gargoyle.

“Shouldn’t you investigate?” he asked.

She looked at him over her shoulder, one eyebrow cocked.

“Investigate what?” she said.

“The men with the skull masks?” he asked.

Brown waved a hand and said, “I’ll tell Oracle about them later. She’s way better at that stuff than me anyway.”

She looked back over the city, and Damian glared at the back of her head. This Batgirl, at least, wasn't a threat to his position. 

Damian did try to sit on the gargoyle. He couldn’t let Brown become suspicious, or give her any reason to tell his father that he was disobeying his orders, but it was hard to sit still. It was cold, and Brown’s approach to vigilantism seemed to be to sit around and wait for crime to happen right under her nose.

After a while Damian couldn’t handle it anymore. He began to pace back and forth across the top of the building, leaning in to look in dark windows, hoping that a crime was happening inside, although he knew this was unlikely.

“Why do you patrol in the Diamond District?” he asked her.

“Why not?” she asked.

“There is more crime happening in other parts of the city. This is the wealthy district. It does not attract as much trouble,” he said.

Brown snorted. “Trust me, this district attracts just as much crime as any other district. More, probably, it’s just harder to see. The crime that happens here bleeds into the rest of the city.”

“It is not going to happen right under your nose, so you must go find it. That is what my father would do,” he said.

“I’m not really in the mood for investigating tonight,” she said.

“Then why patrol at all?” Damian asked, getting frustrated.

“Maybe I’m in a bad mood and I wanted to punch some rich people in the face,” she said.

Damian rolled his eyes and walked away. He walked around the entire ledge of the building until he looped back around to Brown. What if nothing happened all night? He couldn’t waste an entire evening sitting around doing nothing just because of _Spoiler_. But he did not think she would let him lose her either.

When was his father going to let him patrol again?

“Oh my god, kid, what is the matter with you?” Brown said. “I’m exhausted just listening to you pace. Can’t you sit still for one second?”

“You have been sitting still for more than one second,” Damian said.

“Seriously, what’s the matter with you?” she said.

Damian opened his mouth, about to retort that _she_ was his problem, when he thought of something.

It was apparent that she was unwilling to investigate any of her own cases and take him further into the Diamond District of her own accord, but perhaps there was some way she could appeal to her compassionate nature. She had been concerned about the boy before, David. If he could manipulate her into being concerned about him, then he could have her wrapped around his finger.

“There is...I was hoping to be able…” he said.

She turned around and looked at him. “There is what?”

“The other day, while I was patrolling on my own, Huntress showed me something which was concerning.”

Brown raised her eyebrows and said, “Oh?”

“I would have to show you for you to understand,” he said.

“Ok?” she said.

A little while later, they were standing in front of graffiti of a beheaded rook on a wall in a deserted park over in Chinatown. The artist had used yellow spray paint for this one. Brown crossed her arms over her chest as she inspected it.

“So you’re concerned about Gotham’s graffiti problem. I hate to break it to you Rookie, but I don’t think there’s anything the Bats can do about this particular issue,” she said.

Damian gave her a disbelieving look.

“It is obviously a _Corvus frugilegus_.”

“Huh?”

“A rook,” he said.

“Oh. _Oh_ ,” Brown said, rolling her eyes. “You think this is about you.”

“I think that is obvious.”

“And who exactly do you think did this?” she asked.

“Huntress’s theory was the Sirens’ sons,” he said.

“I don’t think they usually go for graffiti.”

“I have discovered one in Robinson Park, and Huntress’s new partner reported seeing one in Crime Alley as well. Nightshade and Jack of Clubs are often seen in those districts. That’s why I wanted to see if there were any beheaded rooks in the Diamond District.”

“Wait, Huntress has a new partner?” she asked. “Who?”

“He calls himself Falconer, but that is not important at this time.”

“Wow, I never would’ve pegged Huntress for the type to take on a sidekick.”

“Spoiler, focus,” Damian said.

Brown snorted. “Alright, fine. So the Sirens’ sons are after you.”

“It is a theory. I did not say that I believed it, simply that I am investigating,” he said.

Brown sighed and said, “And this is what you need my help with? Jesus.”

“What is wrong with you? Are you incapable of taking anything seriously?” Damian snapped.

Brown flinched. Oddly, the questions seemed to jolt her out of her levity. She gave him a long sideways look, then turned to look at the graffiti again.

“If you think it’s important then I’ll take this seriously,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“Alright. Let’s recap. Someone is spray painting dead rooks all over Gotham. Where have you seen them?” she asked.

“East Side, this one in Chinatown, Robinson Park. I have not seen the graffiti in Crime Alley for myself because I do not want to risk running into my father, but now that I have seen rooks in other districts, I have no reason to believe Falconer was not telling the truth.”

“And it’s not some kind of symbol used by any of the Gotham gangs.”

“Not as far as I know, but I haven’t been able to check on Father’s computer,” Damian told her.

“Right. Oracle sees all, knows all.”

“Precisely.”

“Well,” Brown said, narrowing her eyes, “I could look for you now that I’ve seen it. However…”

Damian did not like “however.” “However” did not bode well for him.

“However what?” he asked.

“Are you sure we shouldn’t tell Batman about this? I feel like he would want to know. If someone is really threatening you, then that’s kind of a problem,” she said.

“I would prefer to solve the case on my own. I made a mistake at the department store. I want him to be able to trust that I am mature enough to handle this work. Also, I do not want to cause him needless anxiety in the event that the graffiti turns out to be unrelated to my vigilante persona.”

“I don’t think that sneaking out is the best way to go about proving to your dad that you’re mature,” she said. “And god knows he’s anxious anyway, I don’t see how a little more anxiety could make that much of a difference.”

Damian sighed.

“Of course,” he said, witheringly. “I do not understand why I bothered attempting to involve you. I forgot that your policy is to hand the difficult work over to another party and let them handle it.”

Brown glared down at him. “Excuse me? That is not my policy.”

“‘I’ll tell Oracle about the men in the skull masks later,’” Damian said, in a high-pitched mimicry of her voice. “‘Oracle is better at that stuff anyway.’”

Brown’s eyes went very wide.

“I can handle my own cases,” she said, pointing an accusing finger at him. “I’ve solved plenty of my own cases. Sionis and the gang wars, that was my detective work that sent him to jail! I took down the Ghost Dragons. I was the one who found Cullen Row!”

“That was all a while ago,” Damian said, shrugging. “No offense, Spoiler, but I think you’ve lost your edge.”

There was a beat of silence, and then Brown took two steps toward him.

If they fought now, it wouldn’t be like before. She would take it seriously. Damian was viciously proud of that fact.

There was a long quiet moment while they stared each other down. But Brown did not fight him. Damian found that disappointing.

“We’ll go look around the Diamond District for graffiti,” she said. “And I’ll check the computer later to see if this is on Oracle’s radar yet since you’re grounded and can’t. But if this gets too intense, we’re telling your dad. Deal?”

Damian felt a rush of victorious elation. He wasn’t even angry at her for bringing up the fact he was grounded.

“That is sufficient,” he said.

Brown turned away and muttered something under his breath that he didn’t catch.

“Come on,” she said as she began to walk away.

Damian allowed himself a small smile before he turned around to follow.

They walked down the path toward the park’s exit. They were about to walk under a tree when suddenly there was a crack, as if someone—or something—had stepped on a stick. Brown reached out a hand and held him back.

“What was that?” she said.

“Do not touch me!” Damian said, pushing her arm away.

A dark shadow dropped out of the tree and landed in a crouch on the path in front of them.

For a moment, Damian’s blood turned to ice and he thought, _Batman_.

But no. The shadow was the right color, but far too small. The figure unbent to its full height.

Brown muttered, “Oh, shit.”

“Hello,” Black Bat said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am going to do my best to get chapter 7 out on time but I am sick so no promises :(
> 
> Thanks for reading this far!


	7. Chapter Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The skin on Tim’s arms erupted in goosebumps. All at once, the voices just stopped. Tim opened his eyes, and he was back in his body again, alone in Robinson Park.
> 
> He wouldn’t be alone for long. Something was approaching him, and whatever it was, it was moving fast. Tim had never felt something move so fast before.
> 
> Even as he got to his feet, he knew it was too late to run. Whatever this thing was, he could only hope that the fact that it was coming his way was a coincidence.

Bruce was deep in thought when Barbara’s face popped up on the monitor.

“ _Is this a bad time?_ ” she asked. “ _I don’t want to get in the way of your brooding schedule._ ”

Bruce cocked an eyebrow but didn’t dignify the dig with a response.

In truth, he was sorry to be interrupted. It was a peaceful morning in the cave, and those were becoming harder and harder to come by ever since Stephanie, Harper, and Cullen had moved into the Manor. It seemed like he hardly ever had the cave to himself anymore, but he also knew Barbara wouldn’t interrupt his solitude unless it was important.

“Do you have something for me?” he asked.

“ _Several somethings, actually. Do you want the bad news or the bad news first?_ ”

“Let’s start with the worst news and work our way up,” he said.

Barbara shrugged and said, “ _Suit yourself._ ” Then she disappeared when a black and white video opened on the monitor.

In the video, two masked individuals were having a conversing next to a black car. It was dark outside—night or cloudy, difficult to tell which—but the conversation was happening under a streetlight, so Bruce could make out just enough details to be able to tell who both of the men were.

“Deathstroke,” Bruce said.

“ _Yes, and Black Mask_ ,” Barbara said.

“When?”

“ _Last night at 8:33 p.m._ ,” she said. “ _East End, near that restaurant owned by the Kosovs_.”

“What other intel do you have?” Bruce asked.

“ _Other than the video? Not much. It goes on for about thirty minutes, then they go their separate ways. Black Mask gets back in his car and heads toward The Bowery, but the car disappears in a tunnel. Deathstroke heads south on foot, but I haven’t been able to pick up a trace of him on any other cameras in the area. What you expect, basically, except for this. It’s like they wanted us to see them meet._ ”

Bruce had no doubt that was exactly what Black Mask wanted.

“ _Do you think this is related to the threat Black Mask made?_ ” Barbara asked.

Three days earlier, one of Batman’s informants within Black Mask’s organization reported that he had threatened the life of Imogen Erikson, a DEA agent. Erikson had only been in Gotham for a few months, and she was the young, idealistic kind of agent—the kind who was determined to punish the people who profited from drugs, not the addicts. Her latest busts had left Black Mask deeply irritated.

“It could be.”

“ _I was hoping he was being flippant when he talked about wanting Agent Erikson dead. Calling in Deathstroke is pretty extreme._ ”

Bruce grunted.

“ _What are you going to do?_ ”

“I’ll talk to Black Bat and Batwing, make sure they understand the new stakes,” Bruce said.

“ _You could have Stephanie join the rotation of Bats watching Agent Erikson_ ,” Barbara asked. “ _She’s still unassigned, and the more people who have their eyes on_ —”

“Stephanie doesn’t get involved,” Bruce said.

“ _If she knew_ —”

“She isn’t going to know,” Bruce said.

“ _You’ve been saying for weeks that you want to give Stephanie something better to do than hang around the Diamond District. What could be more important than protecting a woman who’s risking her life trying to make Gotham a better place?_ ”

“Black Mask never got the opportunity to get back at Stephanie for what happened during the gang wars,” Bruce said. “If he finds out Stephanie is involved in protecting Agent Erikson, it’ll only make this worse.”

Barbara sighed, but there was nothing she could do or say to change Bruce’s mind. He wasn’t about to dangle Stephanie in front of Black Mask, even if it would distract him from his grudge on Agent Erikson. There had to be a different way to protect the agent’s life.

“ _Fine_ ,” Barbara said. “ _Moving on_.”

The video of the meeting between Deathstroke and Black Mask disappeared and was replaced by a photograph of a wall of graffiti.

“ _I took this picture at the train station this morning on my way to work_ ,” Barbara said.

She zoomed in on a section of the graffiti, then enhanced the picture so that instead of staring at a dark blur, he was seeing a dripping black raven. A beheaded raven.

“ _It’s new_ ,” Barbara said. “ _It wasn’t there yesterday. I almost didn’t think anything of it, but then…_ ”

“Damian,” Bruce said.

“ _Yes, that was my concern as well_.”

“What else do you know?” he asked.

“ _Nothing. It’s not a symbol used by any of Gotham’s gangs, or at least not any of the established ones. I know I’ve never seen the image spray painted anywhere before and I couldn’t find anything about it in my initial search_ ,” she said.

“Which station?” he asked.

“ _Haysville_.”

“And the station’s cameras?”

“ _Off. They were disabled at 9:59 p.m. and were turned back on by an employee about two hours later. The graffiti wasn’t there just before the cameras went off, and when they came back on, there it was. I reviewed the emails they sent last night after the outage was discovered. A security officer was sent to look around the station, but this was more of a formality than anything else. Apparently their system has been experiencing some glitches and some of the cameras are going offline at random times, so they assumed this was connected to that. I doubt they would have noticed the new graffiti, especially not considering the amount of graffiti that’s already there,_ ” she said. “ _I checked other CCTVs on nearby buildings, but that’s a high traffic area even at night, and I didn’t see anyone who stood out as being out of place._ ”

Meaning she hadn’t seen anyone in a mask.

“The station’s cameras being off while the rook was painted would be one hell of a coincidence,” Bruce said.

“ _I thought so too_ ,” Barbara said.

Bruce leaned back in the chair.

Barbara let him think. She’d been working with him for long enough that she could read him instinctively, almost as well as Alfred could. She didn’t pester him with questions the way Stephanie would or fidget like Harper. She gave him the time to think it through, even when her brain had already drawn its conclusions.

Finally, he said, “I need to go to the station to see it for myself.”

“ _And Damian?_ ” she asked.

“I haven’t allowed him to continue patrolling yet,” he said. And now he wasn’t sure when he _would_ allow Damian to return to patrol. At least not until he figured out whether or not the graffiti was a message for him.

“ _What do you want me to do?_ ” Barbara asked.

“Keep researching the graffiti. And the camera outages at the other stations. I want to know which stations and at what times these outages occurred.”

“ _Already working on it_ ,” she said. “ _Anything else?_ ”

“I’ll let you know if I think of it,” he said.

“ _Understood_.”

“Barbara?”

“ _Yes, Batman?_ ”

“Thank you,” he said.

“ _Of course_ ,” Barbara said, and disconnected the feed.

* * *

It was early afternoon and sunny, and Tim was out in one of the hidden patches of Robinson Park. He was surrounded by trees so tall they even blocked out the Gotham skyline, and tucked deep enough within the forest that he could barely hear the city noise.

But with his feet pressed flat into the ground, he could hear what the green heard—he knew what was happening all over Gotham.

— _attacked three times in six weeks. I’m starting to think my mom was right about me moving to Gotham_ — _can’t believe Jim is actually supportive of this merger_ — _pick up Valerie from school before I take Malcolm to the airport_ — _I’d rather run into Mad Hatter than Riddler, man. I can never figure out riddles_ —

The trouble was sifting through the noise to find the right voices. He could listen in on several conversations at once, but it took all of his concentration. He had to shut his eyes and forget about his body for a little while. It was like meditation, maybe—except Tim hadn’t meditated before the accident, so he didn’t know for sure if it was an apt comparison.

— _but with Mr. Freeze locked up in Arkham the plan fell apart_ — _the mayor’s sick of getting asked why Roman Sionis isn’t behind bars_ — _the last thing anybody wants is to piss Harley Quinn off_ —

His skin prickled. Tim ignored the feeling.

— _Two Face has been laying low lately and it’s making the whole squad anxious_ — _never bodes well when Penguin’s suddenly selling shares_ — _can’t work for Catwoman, she never tells the truth about how much_ —

The skin on Tim’s arms erupted in goosebumps. All at once, the voices just stopped. Tim opened his eyes, and he was back in his body again, alone in Robinson Park.

He wouldn’t be alone for long. Something was approaching him, and whatever it was, it was moving _fast_. Tim had never felt something move so fast before.

Even as he got to his feet, he knew it was too late to run. Whatever this thing was, he could only hope that the fact that it was coming his way was a coincidence.

He wasn’t surprised when, a few seconds later, something too fast to see burst out of the trees and circled around him. It created a little dust devil of brown leaves and dirt in its wake, and then it stopped.

It turned out to be a redheaded boy in a bright white and red suit.

Tim knew who he was right away. There had maybe been an embarrassing period of time in Tim’s life when he was something of a Young Justice fanboy. This was ages ago, way before the accident, but that didn’t mean Tim wouldn’t know Impulse when he was standing right in front of him.

“Dude! What are you doing all the way out here in the middle of nowhere? Where are your clothes? Aren’t you cold? Are you lost?” Impulse asked.

“Uh—”

Instead of letting Tim answer his questions, the boy cupped his hands around his mouth and said, “Hey guys! Over here! I think I found the thing we’re looking for!”

Something passed in front of the sun, casting Tim in shadow. He looked up as three others in suits descended from above.

Tim almost forgot how to breathe. It was Superboy and Wonder Girl.

There was one other person with them who Tim didn’t recognize. He was a lot younger than the others. Since he could fly, had black hair and blue eyes, and was wearing a hoodie with a Super symbol on it, Tim figured he was another Super. When he saw Tim looking up at him, he drifted behind Superboy.

“Was I right?” Impulse asked. “Is his heartbeat what you heard? He looks kinda odd, right? His skin is a weird color. Hey, are you a metahuman?”

This last question was directed at Tim, but Tim was a little distracted. Superboy was staring at him.

Tim had never been the biggest Superboy fan. The girl crazy act he put on was kind of annoying, and Tim had always thought that the leather jacket and fade haircut were lame.

Now that Superboy was right in front of him, however, Tim couldn’t help but notice that Superboy _was_ cute, in a basic prettyboy kind of way. Pictures somehow didn’t capture how tall and broad he was in real life. His eyes were the brightest blue Tim had ever seen, even brighter than Dick’s eyes.

And he still hadn’t looked away.

Tim could feel his face getting hot. He was _blushing_. And because Superboy was looking at him a little too long—of all the lame sidekicks in the world.

“Your heartbeat is odd. What’s wrong with it?” Superboy asked. He split from the rest of his group and drifted closer.

Superboy coming toward him jolted him out of...whatever it was that had been temporarily wrong with him. He backed away with his hands held up.

“Don’t come any closer,” Tim warned him. “Trust me, that is not a good idea.”

“Are you sick or something? Is that what’s wrong with your heart?”

“There’s nothing wrong with my heart,” Tim said. It beat slower ever since the accident, but Ivy said that was normal. Hers was the same way.

“Aren’t you cold?” the little Super asked, looking down at Tim’s shorts and bare feet.

“Not particularly,” Tim said.

“Do you know who we are?” Superboy asked.

Tim rolled his eyes and said, “Superboy, Impulse, and Wonder Girl. I’ve never seen you before, though.”

This was directed at the little Super, who looked up at his older counterpart. He was a cute kid, and there was a strong family resemblance. Tim wondered if they were brothers.

“This is Superman’s son, but you can call him Superkid,” Superboy said.

The kid made a face and tapped him on the shoulder. Superboy looked at him and said, “Super Son?”

The kid frowned again.

“Superlad?”

Superkid groaned.

“Ok, yeah, that last one sucks. We’re working on the name. You get the general idea,” Superboy said.

“And who are you?” Wonder Girl asked Tim.

“Nightshade,” Tim said.

Impulse disappeared. He reappeared a second later, and the only indication of where he’d gone was the rustling of the trees behind them.

“Nightshade is the alias of Timothy Jackson Drake, a known accomplice of the ecoterrorist Pamela Isley, who is more commonly known by her alias Poison Ivy. Like Poison Ivy, Nightshade is a plant human hybrid who has some control over plants and can communicate with them. Unlike Poison Ivy, who uses her skin’s pheromones to control people, Nightshade’s skin creates toxins that make him poisonous. He is currently wanted by the GCPD for destruction of property, grand larceny, assault, and vandalism,” Impulse said.

Wonder Girl’s jaw dropped. Tim stared at Impulse.

“Thanks, Imp,” Superboy said.

Superboy turned back to look at Tim and smiled. It wasn’t the kind of smile he’d use on a cute reporter, though. This smile had more teeth.

“So you’re a criminal,” Superboy said.

He drifted a little closer again, and again Tim backed away.

“Don’t touch me,” Tim told him.

Superboy ignored this and said, “And not just any criminal, but Poison Ivy’s sidekick. I guess that explains what you’re doing hanging out in the park in your bathing suit.”

Tim eyed Superboy and the three other metahumans, then shrugged, trying to appear nonchalant. He’d never fought other metahumans before, so he had no idea if his natural defenses would work on them. The speedster probably, but the Kryptonians and an Amazon? He wouldn’t know unless one of them touched him. The best scenario he could hope for was that the four kids got bored and decided to leave him for Batman to deal with.

“I’m not guilty of half of those charges,” Tim said.

“Is that so?” Wonder Girl asked.

“Yeah. Grand larceny wasn’t me and I never assaulted anyone either. Those were...other people. Not me,” Tim said.

“He’s probably referring to Jack of Clubs and Stray, the sidekicks of Harley Quinn and Catwoman. The three of them are referred to as the Sirens’ sons by the people of Gotham. They often work together to commit crimes. Or at least that’s the rumor, since Stray’s existence has never been officially confirmed,” Impulse said.

“I guess Night-whatever here just confirmed it,” Superboy said.

Tim shot an annoyed look at the speedster while Superkid, eyeing Tim warily now, floated behind Superboy and wrapped his arms around Superboy’s neck. He peeked at Tim from behind him.

“So you _are_ guilty of destruction of property and vandalism,” Wonder Girl said.

“I inconvenienced a few worthless CEOs maybe,” Tim said, rolling his eyes. “They were hurting the environment. I’m not a monster. I wouldn’t go after someone unless I had a good reason.”

Superboy and Wonder Girl didn’t look convinced. Maybe it was time for a different tactic.

“What are you doing in Gotham anyway? Doesn’t Batman get a little territorial when he finds out meta superheroes are picking fights on his turf?” Tim asked.

“We have permission to be here,” Superboy said. “We’re here to ask Batgirl if she’ll join Young Justice.”

“I thought Young Justice had a Batgirl already. The purple one?” Tim asked.

Wonder Girl, Impulse, and Superboy exchanged a look.

“Spoiler was one of the founding members of the team, but she left a couple of years ago and we haven’t had a Batgirl since. Not that it’s any of your business,” Wonder Girl said.

“Right, Spoiler killed Cluemaster,” Tim said. “I guess murderers need not apply.”

Superboy and Wonder Girl’s eyes went as wide as if they’d just been struck. Impulse just looked sad.

Wonder Girl recovered first. She pointed at Tim and said, “Don’t talk about things you don’t understand!”

Tim held up his arms in a gesture of surrender.

“Sorry, it’s none of my business,” Tim said.

“Yeah, it isn’t,” Superboy said. “And I think it’s time for you to go to jail where you belong.”

“What?” Tim said.

Superboy shook Superkid off him and flew toward Tim.

Impulse yelled “No!” at the same time Tim yelled “Don’t!” but it was too late. Superboy grabbed Tim’s shoulders and lifted him into the air.

For one jolting second, Tim felt himself ascending up toward the sky. He caught a glimpse of buildings over the tops of the trees.

Then Superboy started screaming and he let Tim go. The earth rushed back up, but there was a loud _CRACK_ and something caught Tim around the waist before he collided with the ground.

When he looked down, he saw that a huge vine had broken out of the dirt and caught him midair.

“Whoa,” Impulse said, watching with wide-eyes as the vine carried Tim down to safety.

When Tim’s feet reconnected with the ground, he patted the vine and it let him go. He was immediately distracted by Superboy again, however.

Superboy was making a huge racket. The other fliers were crowded around him, looking at his hands. Tim didn’t know what was wrong with them, but judging from the horrified expressions on his and the others’ faces, they were in bad shape.

That answered the question about whether or not Tim’s natural defenses worked on Kryptonians.

He wasn’t sure whether he should stay or run. He felt weirdly guilty about the whole thing. Superboy wouldn’t die, or at least Tim was pretty sure he wouldn’t—he had it on good authority that Kryptonians were a lot harder to kill than humans. And even if he did die, Tim had warned him not to touch him. It wasn’t his fault if Superboy didn’t listen.

Impulse was running back and forth under the Superboys and Wonder Girl, fretting pointlessly on the ground.

“What do we do?” Impulse asked him.

“Take him to Batman,” Tim said. “He has an antidote.”

“Really?” Impulse said.

Tim nodded, although actually he didn’t know that for sure. Ivy definitely had one, but since her formula could make anyone immune to all of the various toxins and pheromones created by her and Tim’s bodies, she was unlikely to share it with Superboy just because Tim felt a little guilty. In all the years he’d known her she’d only ever given that formula to Harley and Jason. She wouldn’t even tell Tim what was in it.

“But what about you?” Impulse asked.

“I’m going to run away. There’s not really anything you can do about it, unless Wonder Girl wants to try touching me too,” Tim said.

Impulse groaned.

“You should go now, if you want to save your friend,” Tim said.

Impulse groaned again, but then he said, “Fine. Wonder Girl! Superkid! Nightshade says we need to get Superboy to Batman so we can get the antidote!”

“What about him?” Wonder Girl said, nodding at Tim.

“Do you want to grab him too?” Impulse asked.

She looked at Tim. Tim stared back at her.

Then Wonder Girl rolled her eyes and said, “Fine. Come on, Superboy. We need to get to Batman.”

Superboy said, “Oh god, it burns! Why does it burn so much? What’s wrong with his skin—”

“Is he going to be ok?” Superkid asked Wonder Girl.

“He’s going to be fine, don’t worry,” she said.

Impulse disappeared again, and this time he didn’t return a second later. Wonder Girl gently pushed the wailing Superboy forward in the air and Superkid followed. Tim watched them until they vanished over the trees, heading north.

Tim couldn’t stay. Now that Wonder Girl, Impulse, and Superboy knew where he was, there was no guarantee that they wouldn’t send a Bat out to look for him as soon as they reached Batman and told him what happened.

Part of him was tempted to follow them to where ever it was they were going. Knowing the location of Batman’s secret hideout would be useful information to have, and it wasn’t like any of them were in any state to notice him following them.

But he hadn’t learned anything at all about the postcard, and that was the whole reason he’d snuck out of the apartment to listen to the green. Right now that was more important.

Shaking his head, Tim turned and headed further into the hidden depths of Robinson Park.

* * *

Harper was working on her homework in her room when her intercom beeped.

“ _Miss Harper?_ ” Alfred said. “ _Could you please come downstairs at your earliest convenience? There are four individuals here who would like to speak to you._ ”

Harper had been Batgirl long enough to know that when Alfred said “downstairs” what he meant was “the cave.” Alfred always specified a location unless he was talking about the cave. But who could possibly be down there who would want to talk to her?

Curious, she immediately got up to go find out.

She was not prepared for what she found when she got there. Cassie, Jon, Bart, and Kon were crowded in the medbay with Alfred and Bruce. Kon was sitting up on the bed, wincing as Alfred dabbed something on his uplifted hands. Bruce was hovering behind them, grim-faced.

“What’s going on?” Harper said.

Cassie and Jon made room for her as she approached the bed. Kon’s hands were bright red and covered in boils.

“Kon had a run in with Nightshade,” Bruce said.

“Nightshade touched him?” Harper asked.

Cassie snorted and said, “No, the idiot touched Nightshade even after Nightshade told him not to.”

“Shut up, Cassie. Ow, ow! It stings!” Kon said.

“You are lucky for your Kryptonian physiology, Master Kent,” Alfred said. “This ointment will not make the pain go away entirely, but it will numb it until your skin has a chance to heal.”

Harper shared a look with Cassie, then turned her attention to Jon, who was hovering next to Kon. He looked a little tense.

“Hey kid,” she said, and waved at him.

Jon’s face lit up when he saw Harper was looking at him.

“Batgirl!” he said.

Harper felt a little rush of elation. Being called Batgirl never got old.

“How’s it going?” she asked.

“I’m a superhero now!” he said. He put his hands on his hips and rose a few feet into the air so she could see his hoodie.

“That’s awesome!” she said.

“Alfred, did you call Damian to see if he wanted to come down and say hi to Jon?” Bruce asked.

“I did, but I am afraid Damian did not respond when I called his room,” Alfred said. “Perhaps he is in the library.”

Jon’s smile dimmed, and he floated back down to the ground.

“Alfred said that you all came to talk to me?” Harper asked them, hoping to distract Jon from the subject of Damian.

“Yes,” Cassie said. “Let’s, um, give Kon and Alfred a minute.”

Cassie put a hand on Harper’s shoulder and steered her away from the bed. Bart followed them out of the medday and down the walkway to the table where the Bats had their nightly briefing meetings, but Jon stayed at his brother’s side.

“We came to Gotham because we wanted to talk to you about something,” Bart said.

“Oh?” Harper said.

“It’s about Young Justice,” Cassie said. “You probably already know this, but the team was originally founded by three members: Kon, Bart, and Stephanie. I joined a little while later and so did Cissie and Greta. But Batgirl, Superboy, and Impulse were the core trio.”

Harper nodded.

“Then Batgirl quit, and Young Justice hasn’t had a Batgirl on the team since,” Bart said.

Harper nodded again. She didn’t have the exact details, but she knew the gist of it, which was that Stephanie left Young Justice after Bruce fired her.

“We asked Cass if she wanted to join Young Justice after Batman made her the new Batgirl, but she, uh, couldn’t talk much then, and she turned us down. But now you are the new Batgirl, and we are here to extend the invitation again,” Cassie said.

Harper was taken aback.

“Really?” Harper said. “To me?”

“Yes, to you,” Cassie said, and Bart beamed at her.

“But...why?” Harper asked.

Cassie and Bart exchanged a look.

“Well, we got to talking about how it would be a good thing to have a Bat on the team again,” Bart said. “Young Justice hasn’t quite been the same without Batgirl.”

“What about Stephanie?” Harper asked.

Bart and Cassie exchanged another look.

“Stephanie is always welcome to join the team again if she wants to,” Cassie said. “We would be happy to have all three of you. Stephanie, Cass, and you, Harper.”

Cassie and Bart gazed hopefully at her.

Getting asked to join Young Justice was awesome—overwhelming, but awesome. Harper had grown up hearing about the exploits of Young Justice on the news. She’d followed Impulse on Vine and watched all of his stupid videos like a million times. She had a Wonder Girl shirt hidden in her dresser upstairs in her room. In a lot of ways, getting asked to join Young Justice was a dream come true.

But.

There were also a lot of good reasons to say no. Being a hero just in Gotham was enough to keep all of the Bats busy for a hundred lifetimes. Young Justice was Stephanie’s team, and Harper already couldn’t figure out how Stephanie felt about her. Alfred insisted that Harper stay in school and keep her grades up.

Then there was Cullen. She only ever got mixed up with the Bats in the first place because she needed to save him from Mr. Freeze. Now she hardly ever got to see Cullen anymore, and if she joined Young Justice then she’d be spending every weekend away from Gotham. She didn’t think she’d be able to live with the guilt if she said yes.

“Um,” Harper said.

They must have been able to tell what she was going to say from her expression, because their hopeful expressions faded into disappointment.

“Harper, don’t let that idiot give you the wrong impression of Young Justice,” Cassie said, gesturing to Kon over her shoulder. “We are all extremely competent heroes. Extremely competent young heroes who occasionally make minor mistakes.”

“I can hear you!” Kon yelled from the medbay.

“No, it’s not—I don’t think anybody’s an idiot,” Harper said. “I just, can’t right now. Not that I’m not, you know, extremely flattered.”

Cassie put on a brave face and nodded.

“Yeah, of course,” she said.

“Maybe over the summer,” Harper told her.

“The summer, yeah,” Cassie said.

“Well, thanks anyway,” Bart said. He smiled at Harper and disappeared in a blur of orange. Harper hoped he wouldn’t break anything.

“Thanks for considering it,” Cassie said.

“No hard feelings?” Harper asked.

“None, I promise.”

“Do you think you could still do me one huge favor?”

Cassie cocked her head and said, “Of course.”

Harper leaned over to Cassie to whisper, “I think my brother would love me forever if I got him Superboy’s autograph.”

Cassie grinned at her and said, “His hands are pretty gross right now, so I don’t know if he’s going to be signing anything for a while. I can probably bully him into a selfie though.”

Harper winced and said, “Right, I forgot.”

“We’d better go check on him and make sure he didn’t permanently break himself,” Cassie said, rolling her eyes.

“Again, I can hear you!” Kon yelled.

Harper and Cassie looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Seeing Cassie’s laughing face, Harper already hated herself for turning down Young Justice. But for Cullen’s sake, no was the right answer.


	8. Chapter Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jason was just walking past the library when he spotted it.
> 
> There was a black car parked under an old oak tree next to the bio building across the street. It was a nice car, and so shiny in the moonlight that it must’ve just been waxed.
> 
> The adolescent car thief in him salivated over that car. The rest of him knew that the car was out of place on campus. It was the kind of car you’d spot pulling up to the skyscrapers over in the Financial District, not parked at a public university. So he casually turned and headed down a different path.
> 
> ...only to walk around a corner and run into a huge bearded guy in a black suit.
> 
> “Mr. Todd,” the man said. “My employer would like to have a word with you.”

Damian missed quiet breakfasts at the Manor. Not even a year ago, it had only been him, Cassandra, Alfred, and Father living at the Manor. Some mornings Cassandra would not come down for breakfast at all. Sometimes his father would get up early, even if he did not need to leave for Wayne Enterprises to see to the family business. On those mornings Damian got his father’s attention to himself.

This was not one of those mornings. Brown was sitting across from him, her blonde hair pulled back in a sweaty ponytail, enthusiastically shoveling too-large pieces of waffle into her mouth. Cassandra was sitting in the chair next to her in an oversized sleep shirt, and was watching something on her phone while she finished a bowl of Rice Krispies. Harper Row and her brother were dressed in their school uniforms and were arguing as they waited for Pennyworth to fetch them for their drive to school. And Father was nowhere to be found.

“I can’t believe Superboy was here and you didn’t call me _immediately_ ,” Cullen said.

Harper slung her backpack over her shoulder and said, “You were at physical therapy! What were you going to do, come home?”

“Yes! I would have come home right away,” he said, following her around the table on his crutches.

“And what would you have told Amanda?” she asked.

“Uh, that Superboy was at my house?”

Harper rolled her eyes and opened her mouth to say something else, but Alfred finally returned to the kitchen and said, “Time to go, or you will both be late.”

Neither of the Row children acknowledged him, but they followed him out of the kitchen, still arguing.

“The next time Superboy is anywhere near Gotham you call me as soon as possible.”

“Again, physical therapy. And I got you a picture.”

“I follow him on Instagram, I can look at pictures of him whenever I want...”

A door shut, and Damian couldn’t hear them anymore.

He breathed a sigh of relief. Silence. At last. He whistled to Titus across the room, who got up to come over and sit under the table at Damian's feet. Damian passed him some of his toast and put a little more honey in his oatmeal now that Pennyworth wasn’t around to tell him off for doing so.

“So, Cass,” Brown said.

Damian sighed again. More talking.

Cassandra looked up from her phone.

“We haven’t really had a chance to chat since Saturday night,” Brown said.

Cassandra raised her eyebrows inquisitively, as if she could have forgotten.

Brown was about to say something else, but at that moment Father walked into the room. Damian’s heart skipped a beat. If Brown had said something damning just a moment sooner…

“Morning,” Father said. He was buttoning the cuffs of his white dress shirt, a jacket slung over his arm. Damian could tell from his suit selection that he would likely soon be off to Wayne Enterprises.

“Good morning,” Cassandra said, smiling at him.

“Morning, Father,” Damian said.

Brown stabbed a large piece of her waffle with her fork and stuck it in her mouth.

Father came to stand over by the table and said, “Are Harper and Cullen gone already?”

“They left a moment ago,” Damian told him.

“Hm, too bad. I was hoping to say goodbye to them before they left. Cassandra, how’s our new friend?”

“Safe,” Cassandra said.

“And Luke?”

“Watching her now.”

“Good,” Father said, nodding. Then he looked back at the kitchen counter toward the coffeemaker and said, “Oh good, there’s coffee. I’m going to need some if I’m going to survive my meetings today.”

His voice was much jauntier than normal, which could only mean that he was already getting into character for interacting with his subordinates. He left momentarily to get a cup of coffee, and Cassandra, now done with her cereal, went back to watching her phone screen.

Father made his cup of coffee and then came back. He spotted Titus under the table as he returned and whistled. Damian felt Titus’s head lift up from where it had been resting on his knee and he went over to Father.

“Titus, get out of there. Damian, you know the dog’s not supposed to be under the table while people are eating,” Father said.

Damian didn’t say anything.

Father came back over and stood near his side, sipping his coffee as he oversaw Damian eating his oatmeal.

“Jon was here yesterday,” Father said.

Damian picked at his oatmeal with his spoon and said, “Oh?”

“Yes, he was. Alfred called your room but he said you didn’t answer. You weren’t ignoring him, were you? We’ve talked about that. You need to answer Alfred when he calls.”

Brown was looking at him. Damian wished she would stop.

“It was sunny, so I was on the grounds doing some plein air painting,” Damian said.

It was a lie, but even if he had been home, he wouldn’t have come when Alfred beckoned. Jonathan Kent was three years younger than Damian and about as dangerous as a newborn deer. The two of them had nothing in common, and Damian had never understood why Father and Pennyworth were so sure he and the boy were destined to be friends.

“I see,” Father said. “What about you, Stephanie? Conner, Bart, and Cassie were here. Didn’t you want to see them?”

Brown poured some more syrup on what was left of her waffle but didn’t say anything.

Father sighed.

“Well, I should get going,” Father said. “Stay out of trouble.”

He left Damian’s side and went across the kitchen. Damian heard him pour out the rest of his coffee in the sink and then he left the room, heading toward the garage using the same route that Alfred and the Row siblings had taken.

Damian waited until he was definitely gone before he looked up at Brown and glared at her.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she said. “I didn’t know he was here. Or awake.”

“Is it your objective to get me in trouble?” he asked.

“No,” she said. “Besides, if you get caught now then I get in trouble too. I’m as committed to this deception as you are.”

“Somehow I find it hard to believe that this is true,” he said.

“What I don’t understand is how we’re not in trouble already,” Brown said, and then she turned to Cassandra.

After a moment of both of them staring at her, Cassandra looked up from her phone and glanced between them, uncomprehending. She said, “What?”

“How come you didn't rat us out to Bruce?” Brown asked.

Cassandra looked in the direction Father had gone, then back over at Brown.

“Why?” she asked.

“Yes, that is what I am asking,” Stephanie said. “Why? Why didn’t you tell Batman that Damian and I were out patrolling together?”

Cassandra looked at Damian again. She set her phone down on the table, and Damian was able to see enough of the screen to tell that she was watching a ballet video. With the sound off.

“It is...not my...business,” Cassandra said.

“But...you don’t keep things from Bruce,” Brown said.

Cassandra shrugged unhelpfully.

“If Cain does not want to tell my father, then perhaps we should not delve into her motives,” Damian said.

Brown frowned at him, then narrowed her eyes at Cassandra again. Finally, however, she shrugged and said, “Well, then thanks, I guess.”

Damian wasn’t stupid. He knew that there was only so long he could lie to his father. With two others involved in the situation now, the lie would undoubtedly unravel even sooner. He could only hope that he found Stray before that happened.

“Are you going to help us?” Brown asked Cassandra.

Cassandra raised her eyebrows. Somehow that was enough to get her question across.

Brown apparently understood her as well, because she said, “Find out who is graffitiing beheaded crows all over Gotham?”

“Rooks,” Damian corrected her.

Cassandra wrinkled her nose and shook her head.

“Why not?” Brown asked.

“Busy,” Cassandra said, and picked up her phone again.

“Yeah, you seem real busy,” Stephanie said, gesturing at Cassandra's phone.

“Black Mask case,” Cassandra said, not looking up from the screen. “Agent...threatened. Luke is watching her now. I will watch...tonight. Sleep first.”

“You are the one who is supposed to be helping me,” Damian told Brown.

“Yeah, but it would look even less suspicious if Cass was the one to use the computer,” Brown said.

This was true, but Damian was unwilling to admit that Brown was right out loud.

“Perhaps instead of trying to pawn work off on someone else, you could just help me as you said you would,” Damian said.

"I will," Brown said, and stuck the rest of her waffle in her mouth.

“Then what are you waiting for?”

With her mouth full, Brown said, “For Babs to go back to work. She works at the library all day on Tuesdays, you know. But she doesn’t work on Mondays, so I’m waiting until a time when I know for sure that she won’t be monitoring the computer.”

Damian wanted to argue, but in truth it was not a terrible idea. Before he could disparage it anyway, Brown got up from the table and picked up her plate. She took the plate to the sink and rinsed it off before coming back around to Damian’s chair.

“Now I’m going to go upstairs to my room and try to get a couple hours of sleep,” Brown said. “Don’t you dare try to leave the Manor without me. I’m watching you.”

She pointed two fingers at her eyes, then pointed them at him. Then she left. Damian watched her go, glaring daggers at her back.

When she was gone, Damian turned back around and said, “ _Tt_.”

“Me too,” Cassandra said.

Damian looked up at her, but she was still watching her phone.

“What?” he said.

“Watching you too,” Cassandra said.

Damian heaved a sigh and got up from the table. He left his bowl of oatmeal for Pennyworth to clean up when he got home from dropping the Row siblings off at school, and whistled for Titus as he walked out of the kitchen.

His father’s wards could not have selected a more inconvenient time to take an interest in him.

* * *

Jason knew it was a bad idea to go to campus. It was an unnecessary risk. Harley probably wouldn’t care, but if Ivy knew she would rip him a new one and Tim would call him a dumbass.

But it wasn’t like Jason was trying to go to his classes. He just wanted to stop by one of his professor’s offices. Dr. Clarke had always treated Jason differently than his other professors. She hadn’t assumed he was Bowery trash just because of his accent. She had an accent too, and even though she never said it, he had a feeling she’d spent some time on the streets too. He felt like he owed her better than vanishing into the ether.

So he waited until sundown, then he grabbed his messenger bag. He put on his glasses and his school hoodie, and went by Dr. Clarke’s office. He gave her some bullshit excuse about a family emergency in another state, then he turned right back around and headed off campus, intending to book it to his nearest safehouse.

He was just walking past the library when he spotted it.

There was a black car parked under an old oak tree next to the bio building across the street. It was a nice car, and so shiny in the moonlight that it must’ve just been waxed.

The adolescent car thief in him salivated over that car. The rest of him knew that the car was out of place on campus. It was the kind of car you’d spot pulling up to the skyscrapers over in the Financial District, not parked at a public university. So he casually turned and headed down a different path.

...only to walk around a corner and run into a huge bearded guy in a black suit.

“Mr. Todd,” the man said. “My employer would like to have a word with you.”

It took Jason longer than he liked to react.

“Sorry,” Jason told the man, shrugging. “You got the wrong guy.”

“I don’t think so, Sir,” the man said. He pulled his suit jacket open a little so that Jason could see the handgun peeking out of a holster.

_Fuck_ , he thought.

“And who is this employer exactly?” Jason asked.

“You’ll see, Mr. Todd. All in due time,” the guy said, and gestured back toward the car. “After you.”

Jason couldn’t see what other choice he had other than to turn around and head to the car. He was almost as big as the other guy, but he had a gun and all Jason had was his fists.

When they reached the car, the bearded man opened the back door for him and said, “Go ahead.”

Jason climbed inside.

There was another man in the car. He was much skinnier than the first man, but he had his gun out and it was pointed right at Jason.

“Sorry about this,” the skinny man said, shrugging.

Jason eyed the gun and said, “No worries.”

The big guy climbed in after Jason and shut the door. He pulled something small and black out of the pocket of his jacket and said, “Sorry about this too Mr. Todd, but our employer insisted.”

The Jason caught a tiny glimpse of the driver before the big guy was suddenly pulling a hood over his face. Immediately afterward, he felt something thin and hard poking into his ribcage. Jason sucked in a sharp breath.

“Is that really necessary?” Jason asked, turning his head toward the skinny one.

Neither man said anything.

This was why Jason was always telling Tim he needed a smaller weapon than his club. Something inconspicuous. Maybe he would start carrying a gun too.

If he even made it out of this alive.

“This seems like a lot of effort to go through for little ol’ me,” Jason said as the car pulled away from the curb.

“Boss likes to play it safe,” said the big guy, and then everyone was silent.

It was one of the longest car rides of Jason’s life. He was pretty sure they took him in circles a few times just to disorient him. Everybody was being so _quiet_. At one point Jason said, “If we’re not going to talk, you could at least play some music or something. Make the drive go faster,” but everyone ignored him and the radio stayed off.

Jason tried to think through who could’ve grabbed him. Not the cops, surely. They would have announced they were cops and anyway, the car was way too nice. No cop was driving a car this fancy.

He couldn’t think of who else he could’ve pissed off though, except for maybe the Bat. But this wasn’t his style at all. Maybe it was Penguin? Jason fucked up one of his limos a few months ago, but he settled all that with Harley. It would be random for him to suddenly be coming after Jason now.

After what felt like forever, the car finally turned and headed sharply down. They drove for a little longer, then they rolled to a stop. The driver turned off the engine.

“This way,” the big man said. He opened the door, grabbed Jason’s bicep, and dragged him out of the car.

The big guy still had his right arm, and the skinny guy came to lead him forward with a firm hand wrapped around his left bicep. Jason could tell from how their feet were echoing that they were in some kind of parking garage. He wished he could see whether or not the skinny guy still had his handgun pointed at him. Jason had to assume he did.

After a short walk, the two men pulled Jason to a stop.

The big guy said, “Boss is expecting us.”

“Of course,” said a new voice.

There was some shuffling and the unmistakable sound of an elevator. Jason heard the ding a few seconds later, then the doors were opening and Jason was being ushered onto it.

The doors closed behind them and Jason said, “You guys aren’t really going to let me go into this totally clueless, right?”

There was no response.

It was a smooth ride up—this had to be one of those fancy high rise elevators that move pretty fast. It was disorienting to be going up so quickly and not be able to see. The elevator dinged again in no time and the doors slid open.

As the two goons pulled him out of the elevator, Jason noticed that wherever he was, it smelled nice. Like food, and Jason hadn’t eaten hardly anything all day. Somehow he wasn’t particularly hungry though.

“We brought him for you, Boss. Caught him on campus,” the big guy said.

“I want to see his face,” a man said.

The hood was yanked off Jason’s head.

Jason blinked in the sudden light. He had been brought to a dark-paneled room—no windows, unfortunately. There was shiny white marble under his feet, and an ornate wooden table in the center of the room under a tasteful chandelier.

And Black Mask was sitting at the head of the table having his dinner.

“Fuck,” Jason said.

“Mr. Todd,” Black Mask said. He gestured to the foot of the table. “Have a seat.”

There was another plate set out at the foot of the table, piled with food. _Presumptuous_ , Jason thought as the two men escorted Jason to the spot. When Black Mask said, “Take the bag,” Jason was relieved of his messenger bag. The two gangsters finally let him go, and under their watchful gaze, Jason sat down.

“That’s all,” Black Mask said to the two men.

The skinny man finally put his gun away and then they both walked back over to the elevator.

“Jason Todd,” Black Mask said when they were gone. “It’s so nice to finally meet.”

“Is it?” Jason asked.

“You can lose the glasses. I know who you are,” he said. He shifted in his chair, and lifted up an arm to set a gun on the table. The barrel wasn’t quite pointed at Jason, but not exactly pointed away from him either. Jason eyed it, then took his glasses off and set them on the table next to his plate.

“Are you hungry?” Black Mask asked.

Jason didn’t want to take his eyes off Black Mask, so he hadn’t inspected what was on his plate too closely. Steak, something green, and something whitish that could’ve been rice or potatoes. It smelled heavenly.

But Jason didn’t have an appetite. Not even close. He’d never met Black Mask before, but he’d heard the stories, and that mask was way freakier in person than it looked in pictures and on TV.

“I’m good, thanks. Got something from a vending machine on campus,” Jason told him.

“What about a drink?” Black Mask asked, picking up a bottle of wine.

“Not thirsty either,” Jason said.

“Have it your way, kid,” Black Mask said, and poured himself a glass.

There was a prolonged moment of silence wherein Black Mask drank his wine and might’ve been staring at him—it was kind of hard to tell one way or the other.

Jason tried to mentally review everything he knew about the guy. His real name was Roman something. Jason couldn’t remember if he wore the mask for aesthetic reasons or because he had a fucked up face or something. Roman had caused a big fuss a few years ago with Gotham’s gangs. He was the worst kind of mob boss, the kind that shot his way through whatever problems got in his way.

And somehow Jason had ended up on his radar.

“I don’t want to be rude,” Jason said, because pigheaded bravado was the only way he knew how to get through anything, “but I can’t help but be curious about why you’ve gone out of your way to drag me all the way up here.”

Black Mask said, “I like you.”

“You could’ve just asked for my number. There was no need to abduct me from campus,” Jason told him.

“I heard you got into a brawl with Batman recently, cut him up a bit,” Black Mask said, ignoring Jason’s cheek. “Is that true?”

“Maybe,” Jason said.

Black Mask tilted his head, like he was assessing Jason.

“I like people who can hold their own against the Bat. That’s why I asked you to come here today. To see if you wanted to work for me.”

Jason was taken aback.

“Work for you? Doing what exactly?” he asked.

“This and that,” Black Mask said, waving a hand. “Think of it as a kind of security job.”

“Security,” Jason said, and pointed toward the elevator. “Like those two assholes in shitty suits who dragged me up here?”

Black Mask tipped his head back and laughed.

When he was done laughing, he said, “You have teeth, Mr. Todd. I like that.”

“It’s about all I have going for me,” Jason told him.

“Rest assured that you would not be like most of my other employees. I like this Jack of Clubs persona you have. You would be more like a partner in my organization. And you’d be paid well. Way more than you could possibly be making working for Harley Quinn,” Black Mask said.

Jason huffed out a laugh before he could shut himself up.

“I don’t...work for Harley Quinn,” he told Black Mask.

“Oh?”

Before the other man could say anything horrifying, Jason said, “She’s kind of like my mom.”

“Harley Quinn’s a little young to be a mother,” Black Mask said.

“That’s why I said kind of like my mom,” Jason said.

“And Ivy? Her boy?” Black Mask asked. “What are they to you?”

“They’re my family,” Jason said.

Black Mask tilted his head and said, “Interesting.”

Black Mask drank his wine, and Jason had a moment to wonder if this was all related to the postcard that showed up at the old house. Sending something via fake mailman was a roundabout way to get his attention, though. Somehow it didn’t seem like Black Mask’s style.

Black Mask set his empty wine glass down on the table and said, “The college student act is cute. But you’re wasting your potential. People who work for me get to be somebody. Don’t you want to be somebody?”

“Not really. Sounds like a lot of work,” Jason told him.

There was a tense moment where the guy didn’t say anything. Jason wondered if he’d been a little too teethy for Black Mask’s liking. Bullet in the forehead had to be a hell of a way to go.

Black Mask didn’t shoot him, though, or even seem to remember his handgun on the table.

“I like to keep up with what’s going on in this city,” he said instead. “Lately there’s been some talk that you and your little...family have run into some kind of problem. Am I right?”

Jason’s blood went cold. He didn’t answer the question.

“I don’t know what kind of enemies you and the Sirens have, and quite frankly, I don’t care. This is Gotham. Anybody who’s somebody has enemies in this town. Rival gangs. Batman. The police. Some other guy in a mask. It’s an unfortunate reality of life here. I can help your family with that.”

Jason narrowed his eyes at him. Reluctantly, he asked, “How?”

“Like I said, I’m a powerful man. I have a web of influence in this city and resources to help protect you and anybody else who’s important to you. When you work for me, your enemies are my enemies. Your family’s enemies are my enemies. If they want to bother you, they’ll have to go through me. Understand what I’m saying?”

Jason stared at him for a long moment.

He hated himself for even considering it. When he was a kid, he’d always told himself that he wouldn’t end up like his old man—that he wouldn’t sell his soul to one of Gotham’s nightmares, not for cash or anything else.

But Black Mask wasn’t wrong. Him, Ivy, Harley, Tim—they had enemies. Batman, the cops, sometimes the other masked rogues too, depending upon who Harley had pissed off lately. Then there was whoever it was who had sent the postcard with Jester’s face scratched all over it. It was exhausting, feeling like they all lived on the cusp of disaster and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

Now here was Black Mask offering him a way to fix it. He was a terrifying guy. People would think twice about fucking with Jason and his family if they knew they were going to get fucked by Black Mask right back. It sucked, but what were his other choices? Seth Richardson was compromised, just like Ivy had suspected. Jason Todd couldn’t do any legitimate work, not with his record. Did he even really have a choice?

“I would have to think about it,” Jason said.

“Of course,” Black Mask said. “Smart guy like you, I expect you’ll want to talk it over with your family.”

“Yeah, something like that,” Jason said.

“Have dinner with me,” Black Mask said, gesturing again at Jason’s plate. “This is a good time for the two of us to get to know each other better. I’m sure you’ve heard a lot of rumors about me, and rumors can be unfair. As soon as dinner’s over, I’ll have my men drop you off wherever you want to go. Anywhere in Gotham. You have my word.”

Jason eyed Black Mask’s gun. Black Mask noticed where he was looking.

“Are you worried about this?” he asked.

Black Mask picked up the gun. Jason watched as he removed the magazine. He showed Jason it was empty, then tossed it onto the middle of the table. The metal chipped the table’s finish when it hit, but Black Mask didn’t seem to care.

Jason relaxed, but just a little bit. The magazine was empty, but that didn’t mean Black Mask wasn't still dangerous.

“Does that make you feel better?” Black Mask asked.

“Slightly,” Jason said. He picked up his fork.

“That’s more like it, Mr. Todd,” Black Mask said, and picked up his knife.


	9. Chapter Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I didn’t know you were in town. I hope you’re not here for me again,” Dick told him.
> 
> “Not this time,” Slade said.

Dick enjoyed morning robberies. They were best for avoiding the Bat, which was the primary reason he liked them. But they also made it easier to pretend that he belonged somewhere he definitely didn’t belong.

Like Mrs. Preston’s closet, for example.

Mrs. Preston was on vacation in The Netherlands and Dick was in the middle of examining the contents of her watch safe. He still had at least an hour before the house sitter got out of class and was having a great time going through several Cartier watches when his serenity was interrupted by a man’s gruff voice.

“Haven’t you outgrown that kind of disguise?”

Dick flinched and almost dropped the watch he was holding. When he turned and looked across the closet, he saw Deathstroke leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest. He was wearing the full getup, mask and all.

“Jesus, Slade. This watch is worth almost ten thousand dollars. Did you have to sneak up on me?” Dick asked.

Instead of answering, Slade pushed away from the doorframe and strolled into the room, examining the racks of clothing and shoes that lined the walls. Mrs. Preston had an impressive collection of Italian leather handbags and designer pumps, but Dick didn’t have the time or the right transportation to take it all.

Slade came to stop by the decorative pink pouf in the middle of the room, and Dick got up and put a hand on his hip. Slade gave him a long, up and down look, from the pink tennis shoes on his feet to the winged eyeliner on his face.

Dick had, perhaps, put more time into this disguise than he usually would put into one of his disguises. Leggings were comfortable and good for movement, and the loose yoga wrap hid his whip behind his back. Maybe— _maybe_ —braiding his wig and doing his makeup hadn’t been altogether necessary. But he had the skills, and it seemed like a waste not to use them.

“The house sitter’s sense of style is what I would call yoga chic,” Dick explained, cocking his hip out a little farther. “How did I do?”

“You don’t pull it off quite like you used to,” Slade said.

“I just needed to look convincing enough for the cameras,” Dick said. There were several around the house, but they were old and the film was grainy.

Slade didn’t say anything.

“I didn’t know you were in town. I hope you’re not here for me again,” Dick told him.

“Not this time,” Slade said.

For a calculating minute, they eyed each other over the pink pouf.

Dick met Slade four years ago. The gist of it was that Dick made the mistake of robbing Carmine Falcone. Falcone hired Slade to bring him Dick’s head, and Slade guessed the fastest way to get to Dick’s attention was to pose as an easy mark. It had worked. Selina’s ability to...aggressively persuade others was the only reason Dick was still alive. That probably should’ve been the end of it.

Except it wasn’t, because Slade made a point to drop by and check up on Dick whenever he was in town. Dick knew that if he had any sense at all he would stay away from Slade, but there was something electrifying about the encounters that left Dick simultaneously exhilarated and exhausted.

When Dick didn’t come any closer, Slade finally said, “What’s wrong? Don’t trust me?”

“Can you blame me?” Dick asked.

“Come on, kid. I promised your mom I wouldn’t kill you. I keep my promises.”

“Always nice to hear,” Dick said. “Nice, but unconvincing.”

Slade didn’t say anything, and since he still had his mask on there was no way to read his expression.

“Are you going to take this off, handsome?” Dick asked, gesturing at his own face.

Slade snorted, but he did reach up and slip his thumb under the orange and black mask. Dick watched him pull it the rest of the way off.

Dick spared a moment to admire his face. Dangerous assassin he may be, but Slade was a silver fox. There was a reason Dick had gone after him so fast when he was playing the dumb mark.

“So if you’re not after me, then who are you after?” Dick asked.

“Doesn’t really seem like your business.”

“You ruin my job and then you don’t even have the decency to tell me why?” Dick asked.

He risked a step around the pouf, pretending to be interested in a pair of red Versace pumps on the shelf near him.

“Like I said, it isn’t any of your business,” he said.

“This was supposed to be a lowkey job, Slade. And it would have been until you rudely showed up here dressed like the mecha ghost of Halloween future, so the least you can do is tell me why you’re back in Gotham,” Dick said.

“I got hired to take somebody out. Government type. Nobody you would know,” Slade said.

“Is that supposed to make me feel better about it?” Dick asked. If he could figure out who it was, maybe he could warn them about what was coming. As attractive as the mercenary was, murder as a casual conversation topic made him uneasy.

“You didn’t have to ask,” Slade said.

“Yes, well, I’ve been in their shoes, whoever they are. I hope they manage to get away from you like I did.”

Slade grunted and said, “They won’t.”

Dick was wondering what he could say to get more information out of him when Slade pointed two fingers at the watch safe and said, “Don’t let me interrupt your work. I’m sure you know how to multitask.”

Dick shot him a significant look and said, “You have no idea.”

“Don’t flirt with me, Stray. I’m not some pent up security guard you can distract with a little smirking and skin,” Slade said.

“And yet you keep coming back to see me.”

“Maybe I come to see you because I like to imagine killing you,” Slade said, and took a step toward him. He was a lot taller than Dick—it was a concern, and yet somehow Dick didn’t feel as concerned as he probably should be.

“Oh?” Dick said.

“I won’t. I promised Catwoman I wouldn’t and I don’t need her as an enemy. But I suppose I do like thinking about my fingers wrapped around your pretty neck,” Slade said.

His tone was suggestive enough that Dick almost took another step toward him. If he did, they would be close enough to touch.

He didn’t. Instead they just stared at each other. Dick was pretty sure that this was what this little game between them was about—both waiting for the other to crack under the tension, to yield. Dick refused to yield.

Or maybe he was an idiot and imagining the tension altogether, and Slade really did like thinking about killing him. Either way, at least Dick was having a good time.

The moment was broken by Dick’s phone buzzing in his pocket.

“Do you need to get that?” Slade said.

Dick pulled out his phone. He was expecting to see the name Cat on the screen, but it didn’t. Dick pressed the green button and put the phone to his ear anyway.

“Ivy?” he said.

“ _Dick! Thank god. I need your help_ ,” she said.

“With that?” he asked.

“ _No one came home last night. Harley’s phone is going straight to voicemail and Jason and Tim aren’t picking up_ ,” she said. “ _I need to look for them but I can’t be in three places at once. You hang out with Jason sometimes on the weekend right?_ ”

Dick was actually familiar with some of the places where both Tim and Jason liked to hang out. Jason’s hangouts were various bars of course, while Tim went for isolated spots in Robinson Park.

“I can look for Jason and Tim,” he said.

“ _Thank you, Dick_ ,” she said. “ _I’ll text you an address. Bring them there_.”

“I will,” he told her.

Ivy hung up without saying goodbye. Dick tucked his phone back into his pack.

“Family trouble?” Slade asked.

“Not my family, but close enough I guess,” Dick told him.

“Well,” Slade said, and looked around Mrs. Preston’s closet. “Too bad.”

He didn’t say too bad about what. Dick didn’t ask him to elaborate.

“So long, Stray,” Slade said, and put his helmet back on. “I don’t suppose I should bother telling you to stay out of trouble.”

“I won’t get in half as much trouble as you,” Dick said.

Slade turned and headed for the door. As he walked away he said, “By the way, the next door neighbor’s maid saw me when I broke in. The police should be here any minute.”

“ _What?_ ” Dick said, but as soon as he said it, he heard the whine of a police siren that was far too near for comfort.

Slade just laughed and strolled out of Mrs. Preston’s bedroom like he had all the time in the world to get away.

* * *

Stephanie couldn’t help it if her mind wandered during the nightly briefing meetings. Sometimes Damian said something insulting or unintentionally funny, but ever since he’d been grounded, he hadn’t been invited to the attend. So there was no point in paying attention.

Somehow, though, that night she found herself listening anyway.

“...and Harper? How is your case going?” Bruce asked.

Across the briefing table, Harper sat up straighter and looked eagerly up at Bruce. Stephanie could remember being that enthusiastic to have his attention. It felt like an eon ago.

“I have good news, actually. I was able to figure out the identity of Huntress’s new partner,” Harper said.

“Oh? That is good news.”

Bruce sat down then, which was an indication that Harper should get up and take over. Harper got up and went over to the screen, where she said, “Babs, could you bring up the Falconer file?”

“ _Of course_ ,” Babs said, and the whole file opened on the screen, complete with a picture of a boy in a black and yellow suit.

“So Falconer is really named Duke Thomas,” Harper said.

Babs helpfully brought up what had to be a school photo of Thomas. He was a handsome kid, Stephanie thought. His suit was pretty cool too.

“How old is he?” Bruce asked.

“Sixteen.”

“What’s the connection between Bertinelli and Thomas?” he asked.

“He was a student at Helena’s school.”

“Was?”

“Thomas is in the foster system?” Harper said.

There was a slight inflection at the end of her sentence, kind of like she was asking them. She was pretty new at this whole nightly briefing thing, so sometimes she still sounded like she was asking them if her information was accurate. Bruce would no doubt train her out of the uncertainty eventually.

“He spent about a year living with this family, David and Pauline Harris. They sent him to Huntress’s school and he was enrolled in her class, but he got expelled because he kept skipping,” Harper went on. “I was able to access his student record and there were some incidents with fighting as well. Afterwards, Thomas was sent on to live with a new family over on the north side of East End. But he’s still keeping in touch with Helena Bertinelli. Obviously.”

Bruce eyed the screen broodily and asked, “So how did he wind up a vigilante?”

“Uh, well, it looks like Thomas’ parents were jokerized a couple of years ago, not long before—”

Harper stopped herself and did not say “before Damian stabbed The Joker with a katana and dumped him into the harbor,” but they all knew that was where the sentence was supposed to go.

“—uh, Joker’s death, and Thomas’s parents haven’t recovered. I checked,” Harper said. Photographs of Duke Thomas’s parents came up on the screen behind her. “My guess is that Huntress thought he needed an outlet, some way to deal with what happened to his parents before he got himself hurt, so she decided to train him. But I didn’t talk to either of them, so that’s just a hunch.”

“Thank you, Harper,” Bruce said. “I am concerned that someone as emotionally volatile as Helena Bertinelli is training a young person to be a vigilante.”

Stephanie snorted. She couldn’t help it. In her peripheral vision, she saw Bruce look at her, but Stephanie didn’t look at him.

He went on.

“I will make a point to check up on the East End to see if we need to intervene,” Bruce said, and Harper nodded.

“ _That’s all for tonight. You all have your assignments_ ,” Babs said, and the screen went blank.

All except for Stephanie, but no one said it. That was fine with her, though. She had plans to patrol with Rook in the Financial District later, and getting an official assignment from Bruce or Babs would cramp her style.

As Harper, Cass, Stephanie, and Bruce were getting up from the table, Bruce said, “Stephanie.”

Stephanie looked at him, eyebrows raised.

“I need to speak with you,” he said.

The others lingered, but Bruce gave them a stern look and said, “Go suit up. This won’t take long.”

Stephanie and Cass made eye contact for a moment. Then she and Harper went on to the equipment lockers to start putting on their gear, leaving Stephanie alone with Bruce. Well, alone with Babs most likely listening in.

“What?” Stephanie said when they were gone.

Bruce crossed his arms over his chest and _loomed_ , and Stephanie’s heartbeat kicked up a notch. She hated the fact that it still got to her when he had that craggy disapproving frown on his face.

“Barbara told me that you accessed the computer earlier today,” he said.

_Damn_ , she thought. She was so careful.

“Yes?” Stephanie said.

“And you were researching graffiti around the city?” Bruce asked.

“Yeah, so?” she said.

Behind her, something flashed on the screen. When Stephanie turned around, she saw that Babs had pulled up a picture of the beheaded rook graffiti. This was a different one from the ones she had seen. The label said, _Tricorner Yards_.

“This graffitied image in particular,” Bruce said.

“Again: yeah, so?” Stephanie said.

“ _Do you have anything you want to tell us about this image_?” Babs asked.

“Only that I saw one spray painted on a wall down in Chinatown,” she said.

“ _So you decided to look it up_?”

Stephanie’s temper spiked.

“I don’t know, it looks kind of alarming if you ask me,” she said, trying to keep her voice even. “Doesn’t it remind you of somebody?”

Neither Bruce nor Babs responded to that.

When they didn’t say anything, Stephanie said, “What’s going on here? Am I not allowed to touch the computer now or something?”

“You should share what cases you are working on with the rest of the team so that we are all informed,” Bruce said. “You know better than to skulk around investigating things in secret behind our backs.”

“I don’t skulk,” Stephanie snapped. “I looked up some graffiti. I didn’t realize I had to ask for permission to do a database search.”

He said, “I’m not asking you to get permission. I’m asking you to communicate with us.”

Stephanie raised her eyebrows and said, “So I have to include you in what I’m working on, but you can shut me out as much as you want?”

“What are you talking about?” he asked.

“I’m talking about the fact that there’s this top secret Black Mask case that no one will discuss in my presence. You know, the one you have Cass working on every night? Kind of a big deal? But for some reason I’m in the dark. Who do you think taught me to skulk around behind people’s backs, Batman?” she asked.

“That case is a delicate. It’s a different situation,” he said.

There was a note of finality in his voice, that immovable tone. She recognized it well. That was Batman’s “Stephanie Brown is a screw up and will ruin the case if she even breathes on it” voice.

“How’s it different?” Stephanie asked. “Please tell me. I love listening to you justify yourself.”

“ _Stephanie_ —” Babs said, but Bruce interrupted her.

“You and Black Mask have a history. The situation is already unstable enough as it is, and if he finds out you’re involved then it will only get worse,” he said.

“Why don’t you just admit you don’t think I can handle him?” she asked.

“That’s not—”

“I was researching the graffiti because I saw it and thought it was alarming. But obviously you already know about it so I guess there’s no reason for me to worry about it anymore. What a relief!” she said, with false cheer.

Then she turned and walked away.

Bruce called after her, and his voice was just sharp enough that she almost turned back around.

But instead she ignored the years of training that were howling at her to listen to him, and she kept walking toward the equipment lockers.

* * *

Dick did track down Tim and Jason, but it took all day. It was way past sundown by the time he found both of them, and since they were both wearing their suits, he didn’t think it was a good idea to take them to the address Ivy had texted him hours earlier. He took them somewhere else instead.

He let them have it as he unlocked the door.

“I can’t believe that Jay gets threatened and you’re both stupid enough to think that it’s a good idea to go out. And not just out, but out as Nightshade and Jack of Clubs. I expect this level of dumbassary from Jason, but you Tim?”

“Hey!” Jason said.

Dick opened the door and jerked his head. Both boys went in willingly, although there was a bit of dark muttering from Jason. Dick decided to ignore it.

Dick locked the door behind them, then flipped the light switch. As the room was was illuminated, Jason and Tim took in their new surroundings.

“Wow. This place is a dump,” Tim said.

“Thanks,” Dick said.

He carefully went around him to the kitchen. He immediately stripped off his hoodie and tossed it on the pile of dirty clothes on the couch, then rifled around in the laundry basket on his kitchen table for a clean shirt.

Meanwhile, Jason went walked over to his bookshelf and ran a finger along the wood, then he inspected his finger like he was checking for dust. Tim stopped in front of the Flying Graysons poster on the wall next to Dick’s bedroom door.

“Wait,” Tim said. “You...live here?”

“Home sweet home,” Dick said.

“Jesus Christ,” Jason said. He turned around and looked at the rest of the room, particularly the floor.

It was, perhaps, a bit of a mess. There were bits of various disguises cast here and there, and a pile of rings and necklaces and other various trinkets Dick hadn’t sold yet in a pile on the coffee table. His Stray suit was draped over the back of his kitchen chair. All of his bowls and most of his mugs were piled dirty in the sink.

“Can’t you steal yourself a duster? Maybe maid service. Can one burgle maid service?” Jason asked.

Dick didn’t dignify this with a response.

“How do you…?” Tim asked, peeking into Dick’s dark bedroom.

Tim didn’t have to finish the question. While the apartment _was_ kind of a dump—the bathroom was tiny, it leaked when it rained, and it was drafty as hell during the winter—it was a larger place than most people could afford in Gotham. Particularly people like him.

“It was a gift,” Dick said.

“A gift from who?” Jason asked.

“Penguin. I stole something back from Two Face for him and he offered me this place as payment,” Dick said.

It was also nice and private, which made it ideal for sneaking in and out as Stray. The only other people who lived there were various associates who had also done special favors for Penguin.

Dainty as a cat, Tim stepped over and around the various things on the floor and went to stand across the room by the window. He looked out at the view.

“You can see the river from here,” Tim said.

“Nice view, right?” Dick asked.

“Sure. Who doesn’t love a view of a polluted river?” Tim asked.

“Why are we here?” Jason asked Dick.

“Couldn’t take the two of you walking through Gotham dressed like that,” Dick said, nodding at their suits. “Plus we still need to wait for Ivy. I should text her to let her know about the change of plans.”

He pulled out his phone to text Ivy while Jason walked back over to the couch.

Jason pulled off the lower half of his mask and dropped it on the coffee table next to Dick’s pile of unsold jewelry. Dick glanced up and saw him pick up the pile of laundry on the couch and walk it over to the open closet that was home to Dick’s old washer and dryer. He had been a little drunk when Dick and Tim found him, but apparently wasn’t so drunk that he couldn’t clean Dick’s apartment.

_Brought Tim and Jason back to my place. They were wearing their suits. What do you want me to do?_ Dick wrote, then pressed send.

Ivy texted back almost right away.

_I’m nearby_ , she said. _I will be there soon._

He sent a thumbs up emoji, then put his phone back into his pocket and walked into the living room. He moved his old plaid armchair a little bit so he could see both of the boys and sat down.

“I can’t even begin to understand what could have possessed you two go out like this”—Dick gestured to Tim’s tight purple shorts getup—“when you still don’t know who is out there trying to get to Jason.”

Tim crossed his arms over his bare chest and said, “That’s exactly what I was trying to figure out. I was listening to the green.”

Dick sighed and said, “I don’t know what that means, Tim.”

“He was talking to trees,” Jason said.

“Stop telling people that. I don’t talk to them, I listen in on what’s going on around the city. I can listen in so long as people are talking around something green,” Tim said.

Dick felt a faint flicker of surprise. He hadn’t known Tim could do that.

“And you can’t do that, I don’t know, at home? Where you’re safe?” Dick asked.

“There’s not a lot of ground I can contact directly at the new place, and I can focus better if I am surrounded by as much green as possible. And anyway, I was safe. I fought Superboy and I won,” Tim said.

Jason, who was now in the kitchen rifling through the cabinet under Dick’s sink, said, “No shit, you did?”

Dick turned around and watched Jason pull a bottle of Clorox out of the cabinet. He looked around for a washcloth next, then inspected it for cleanliness and started to wipe down the counters. Dick was a little insulted by all of this, but decided not to stop him. If Jason wanted to clean his place for free then Dick would let him.

“Well, I didn’t really fight him. He and some of the other Young Justice kids found me in Robinson Park the other day. Superboy tried to grab me and he got burned, so they left.”

Jason whistled appreciatively.

“Did you kill him?” Jason asked.

“No. He was back in Metropolis by the next morning. But still, I burned him pretty bad. If I don’t even have to worry about even the Kryptonians being able to touch me then there’s not a whole lot I have to be concerned about,” Tim said.

“Batman caught you once,” Dick reminded him.

“I wouldn’t fall for that again,” Tim said.

Dick was distracted from the argument when Jason said, “I made a new friend too.”

Dick and Tim looked over at him and Tim said, “What? Who?”

“Black Mask,” Jason said.

Dick felt a stab of alarm, and Tim’s mouth opened in a silent gasp of surprise.

“What?” Dick said. “When? How?”

“He abducted me yesterday. I went by campus to say goodbye to one of my professors and some of his goons got me while I was leaving.”

Tim and Dick exchanged anxious looks.

“Well, moving past how incredibly stupid it was of you to go to campus, what else happened? Did you fight him? What did he want?” Tim asked.

“No, I didn’t fight him. He made me have dinner with him. Then he offered me a job,” Jason said.

“A job? Doing what?” Dick asked.

“Oh, you know,” Jason said as he set a dirty cup into the sink. “Something about security, vague and illegal, et cetera, et cetera. He wasn’t forthcoming with the details.”

“You can’t take it,” Tim said, a little too loud.

Jason didn’t say anything.

Dick and Tim exchanged another look, and then Tim went over to stand in the kitchen next to him. He nudged Jason’s arm and said, “Jason, you can’t take it.”

“Relax, Timothy, I didn’t give him an answer. I said I would think about it,” Jason said.

“Why didn’t you say no?” Dick asked.

Jason, again, didn’t say anything.

“You can’t be serious,” Tim said.

“He made some good points,” Jason said.

“The guy is a psychopath,” Dick told him.

“Yeah? So’s Harley,” Jason snapped.

“That’s different and you know it,” Tim said. “Harley would rip someone’s arm off for hurting you. Black Mask would shoot you in the face if the mood struck him.”

“Yeah? Well what else am I supposed to do?” Jason asked as he wiped down the dusty toaster.

Tim frowned down at him.

“What do you mean?” Tim asked.

“I can’t go to school anymore. I have a record and the cops are looking for me so I can do anything legit. So what else am I supposed to do? You have your whole deal getting rights for plants or whatever with Ivy, but I don’t have a purpose like that. Not anymore,” Jason said.

“Jason,” Tim said, “Harley doesn’t expect you to do anything. Nobody expects you to do anything, let alone work for a madman like Black Mask.”

“Are you even sure that he wants you to actually work for him? Maybe he wants to strap you in a leather harness for other nefarious purposes,” Dick said.

“I don’t think he’s into me like that, and for the record, you have no right to judge me if that ended up happening,” Jason said.

Dick cocked his head and said, “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about the fact that Deathstroke is back in town. Everybody was talking about it at the bar tonight. Have you already tried to get into his pants or are you saving that for later tonight?”

“That's not the same,” Dick said, feeling his cheeks start to flush. There was no way either of them could’ve known that Dick saw Slade that morning.

“How is that not the same? Deathstroke is a meta assassin who tried to kill you. If anything, it’s worse,” Tim said, taking Jason’s side. As usual.

“I can take Slade,” Dick said.

“Wasn’t Selina the one who fought him?” Tim asked.

“Ok Timothy al Ghul, are you sure this is really an argument you want to start with me?” Dick asked.

Jason cackled. Tim shot Jason a betrayed look, but Jason just smirked and kept cleaning.

“Ra’s—I’m not—” Tim stammered.

The rest of his sentence faltered to a stop. He was blushing. Dick thought it was adorable how he got so flustered. When he shot Dick a wide-eyed, indignant look, Dick waggled his eyebrows.

“Ra’s al Ghul isn’t interested in me in that way,” Tim said, recovering. “He just thought it was interesting how my skin is toxic and wanted me to join the League of Assassins.”

“Ok,” Dick said, shrugging. “I’m just saying, you sure did bring him up a lot for a while there after he left.”

“Because he was creepy! And so is Deathstroke and so is Black Mask. I turned Ra’s al Ghul down and you will turn down Black Mask if you have any sense at all.”

This last bit was directed at Jason. Tim left Jason’s side after that and went to look out the window again.  

Jason’s mouth twisted into a firm line, but he didn’t say anything.

“I agree with Tim,” Dick said. “We have the Sirens. We don’t need anybody else.”

Jason still didn’t say anything.

Dick was about to ask him a question when Tim abruptly turned around and started to cross the living room.

“Hey, where are you going?” Dick asked as Tim passed him.

“Ivy’s here,” Tim said.

He went to the door and let Ivy in.

Dick turned around and saw, to his surprise, that Harley wasn’t with her. In the open doorway, Ivy said something low to Tim that Dick couldn’t hear before pulling him into a hug.

A couple seconds later, the door shut and Ivy and Tim came into the living room.

“Hello Ivy,” Dick said, smiling up at her.

“Dick,” she said. She came over and put a hand on his shoulder. She squeezed it and said, “Thank you for finding them.”

“Of course.”

Ivy let him go and went over to check on Jason. He was still scrubbing at the kitchen counters, and didn’t look up from his task or acknowledge her in anyway. Eventually she turned around and looked over at Tim.

“Sneaking out of the apartment was extremely risky,” she told him.

“I was fine,” Tim said.

“I was hoping that you would keep an eye on Jason while I was working.”

Tim glanced over in Jason’s direction and said, “I...didn’t realize that.”

“I’m not a child,” Jason said.

Ivy turned back to Jason and said, “Then you shouldn’t act like one. Where have you been?”

Jason didn’t say anything, and when she turned back to Tim, he didn’t provide an answer either. After a moment, she turned around and looked at Dick.

For a second, he considered telling her about what Jason said about Black Mask. Then he thought better of it and shrugged at her.

When it became obvious that Dick wasn’t going to rat them out, Tim said, “He was just out drinking, Ivy. He went to one of those dives in Crime Alley where all the freaks hang out.”

“Like you aren’t one of them,” Jason said.

Ivy sighed and said, “Boys, please don’t fight.”

“So where is Harley?” Dick asked, changing the subject. “You said earlier you were going out to look for her. Did you find her?”

“No, but she finally texted me back about an hour ago and she’s fine,” Ivy said, putting her hands on her hips. “She decided to go to Blüdhaven for some carnival.”

“Oh, good,” Dick said.

Behind her, Tim frowned.

“That’s weird,” Tim said. “She texted me about an hour ago too and said she was going to go break Bud and Lou out of the Gotham City Zoo.”

Ivy frowned as well. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and tapped at the screen.

“No, she definitely said she was at the carnival,” Ivy said. “Maybe she was going to get Bud and Lou later?”

Tim, tense now, shook his head. He said, “No, because she asked for my help. She wanted me to meet her there.”

In the kitchen, Jason dropped the rag. Dick watched him pull out his phone and tap at the screen.

“Harley texted me an hour ago too,” he said. “She said she wanted me to come home and snuggle with her because she was lonely.”

Tim, Ivy, and Jason all looked at each other. There was a long, drawn out moment where none of them said anything, and Dick sat there helplessly watching.

Ivy walked across the room to the window. They watched as she tapped her phone screen and put the phone to her ear.

Dick didn’t think anybody was even breathing as the phone rang.

Ivy tapped one of her heels on the floor as it kept ringing and ringing.

At last, there was the unmistakable sound of Harley’s enthusiastic voicemail message. It was loud enough that Dick could recognize it even across the room.

Ivy hung up and called Harley again.

It rang and went to voicemail for a second time. She hung up and called again.

This last time, the phone didn’t even ring once. They all immediately heard the jubilant sound of Harley’s voice. Dick was relieved for an instant, then anxious again when he realized that the call had gone straight to voicemail.

Ivy waited until Harley’s message ended, and when it was her time to talk, she said, “Harley, it’s me. Call me right away.”

She hung up and turned back around.

Ivy stared over at Tim, then she looked over at Jason. There was another long, gloom-filled moment where nobody said anything.

At last, Dick cleared his throat and said, “I think we should probably call Selina.”


	10. Chapter Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “What is it, Alfred?” Father asked.
> 
> “Someone is here to see you, Master Bruce.”
> 
> “Now? We’re in the middle of dinner. Can they come back later?”
> 
> “She was persuasive, Sir,” Pennyworth said.
> 
> He stepped to the side and Selina Kyle walked into the room.

Stephanie Brown was not at dinner on Wednesday evening.

The rest of them were there. Harper and Cullen Row were engaged in a debate about whether or not an animated television show had satisfactory diverse content. Father was at the head of the table with Cassandra at his right. They were discussing Wayne Enterprises business. On a normal evening, Damian would interrupt to remind them that as his father’s only biological heir, he would be inheriting the company, but he did not want to be drawn into any discussions, arguments or otherwise.

Brown had been uncharacteristically snappish and taciturn while they were patrolling in the Financial District last night, which gave Damian the impression that something must have happened to put her in a bad mood. Her absence was additional evidence that something was wrong. But of course, Damian could not mention her ill humor to his father without revealing that he had been out on patrol.

It wasn’t that he cared, of course. The state of Brown’s emotional well-being was none of his concern. However, Brown having a foul temper meant that she did not want to do anything, and this derailed Damian’s objectives. He needed her good mood restored so that he could continue manipulating her.

“Damian, is there something wrong with your dinner?” Father asked.

Damian looked up at him and frowned.

“No,” Damian said.

“Are you sure?” Father asked. “You’ve been pushing it around with your fork for ten minutes. Are you sick?”

“ _Tt_. I was lost in thought.”

“What are you thinking about?”

Damian looked around the table and saw that everyone except for Cassandra was staring at him. He shot them his most scathing glare. Then he turned his gaze back to his dinner as if they were all beneath his notice, because they were.

“Nothing I wish to discuss,” he said.

Father grunted and said, “Well, let us know if you change your mind.”

In Damian’s peripheral vision, he saw his father turn his attention toward the younger Row sibling. Father said, “How was school today, Cullen? Are you excited about winter break?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Cullen said. “Today Ms. Broussard assigned a project for over the break though.”

“Oh?” Father said.

The younger Row went on telling his boring story about a biology project, so Damian didn’t bother paying attention.

He had returned to the problem of Brown in his mind again when Pennyworth entered the dining room and cleared his throat.

“What is it, Alfred?” Father asked.

“Someone is here to see you, Master Bruce.”

“Now? We’re in the middle of dinner. Can they come back later?”

“She was persuasive, Sir,” Pennyworth said.

He stepped to the side and Selina Kyle walked into the room.

Everyone froze. Even Cullen Row, who had never interacted with her as her alter ego.

There was a small smile on the woman’s dark lips. She was clad in a tight black sheath dress, and her hair came down in a perfect curl around her chin. She glanced around at all of them, looking to Father last.

“Hello Bruce,” she said. “And children.”

Cassandra was the only one who returned the greeting. Cullen and Harper were staring at her, stunned expressions on their faces, and Damian was too busy glaring at her.

Kyle was Stray’s mentor. The man had become corrupted as a consequence of her influence. Father had some kind of emotional weakness for her, but Damian could not be distracted by something as irrelevant as beauty. Were it up to him, she would be in Blackgate with the rest of Gotham’s scum.

Father stood up.

“Selina,” he said pleasantly. “What are you doing here?”

“I apologize for interrupting. There’s something urgent that I need to talk to you about. It’s an emergency.”

Father glanced around the room at their watching eyes, then back over to Selina. He said, “Sure. Why don’t we go to my study?”

Damian watched him go over to her and offer her his arm, and she took it.

“I’ll be back,” he told them, and walked out with the woman.

Damian turned back to his plate. As soon as the sounds of their footsteps faded, Cullen Row let out a soft hiss of surprise.

“What is she doing here?” he whispered to his sister.

“I don’t know,” Harper Row said.

“Now, now. Let’s not discuss Master Bruce and Miss Kyle’s business,” Pennyworth said. “Finish your dinner.”

He turned around and headed back to the kitchen.

Damian looked down at his plate. Butternut squash ravioli was one of Pennyworth’s better vegetarian dishes, but now the sauce was starting to congeal. For some reason he had not had an appetite all day.

“I’ve never seen her in person before,” Cullen whispered to Harper.

“I have. She’s terrifying. Cool, but terrifying,” Harper said.

“She’s beautiful. I mean, she is in the pictures of her, but somehow she’s even more beautiful in real life.”

“I have lost my appetite,” Damian said. He pushed his chair back from the table and the legs screeched across the floor. No one said anything as he got up and walked out of the dining room.

Damian left through the east door. He let them see him go in the opposite direction of his father’s study, but as soon as he was out of sight, he looped back around and headed straight there.

It wasn’t a short walk. When he at last reached the correct hallway, he was unsurprised to find that it was dark. He did not need light to be able to make his way down to the right door, however. This was not the first time he had eavesdropped on one of his father’s private conversations.

He could hear the gentle murmur of their voices as he approached the study.

“...be so sure she doesn’t want to be found?” Father asked.

“You don’t know her like we do. She wouldn’t lie to Pam. She may say she’s going somewhere and change her mind, but she wouldn’t purposefully mislead them,” Catwoman said.

Damian assumed from the context that they were speaking of Harley Quinn. He risked a couple steps closer to the door, careful not to step on the particular floorboard that creaked.

“Where is Ivy now?” Father asked.

“Searching for her over in Otisburg. That was the last place Pam saw her,” Catwoman said.

“Does she know you’re here?”

“No, she doesn’t. She didn’t want me to tell you. She’s not convinced that you or one of your children aren’t somehow connected to everything that’s happened,” Catwoman said.

“I don’t want to start a war with Poison Ivy,” Father said.

“She hasn’t slept for almost two days, Bruce. Neither has Jason. They need help whether or not they admit it.”

“I can ask Harper and Stephanie to help look for Harley, but Cassandra and Luke are busy,” he said.

“And you?”

“I’ll do what I can, but I am...preoccupied with my own family matter,” he said.

Damian puzzled over this. What family matter? Perhaps he was speaking of some problem with Stephanie, and that was why she had been missing from the dinner table.

“That’s all you can do?” Catwoman asked. “You’ll send us the baby Batgirl and the loose cannon?”

Father’s tone was sharp when he said, “Stephanie is one of my oldest and most highly trained partners. Harper may be green, but she is a genius. They should be a great asset to you and Ivy.”

There were several things that Damian wanted to say about these pronouncements, and was frustrated that he had to hold his tongue. Catwoman, on the other hand, did not seem to have a response.

“As soon as some of our other problems are dealt with, Cassandra and I can focus on finding Harley. I promise, Selina.”

Catwoman sighed and said, “I didn’t mean to sound ungrateful. I am thankful for anything you can do.”

“Where are the others already looking?” Father asked.

“Jason is searching Crime Alley,” Catwoman said. “Tim is doing something for Ivy at the Botanical Gardens. Dick is searching Amusement Mile.”

Every nerve in Damian’s body became alert.

“I’ll send Stephanie to Burnley and Harper can look for her in The Bowery,” Father said.

Damian, no longer interested in the conversation, turned and slipped away back down the long hall.

Right at that moment, Stray was out in Gotham City searching for Harley Quinn. And now Damian knew just where to find him.

* * *

Tim was listening to the green for Harley at the Giordano Botanical Gardens when he heard a soft whoosh of air behind him.

Lanterns lined the winding pathways through the trees at the Gardens, so when Tim turned around it was bright enough to see the figure floating in the air behind him. His arms were crossed over the S on his chest.

“You,” Tim said. He got up and backed away from Superboy.

Superboy kept glowering at him, but he didn’t float any closer.

“What are you doing here?” Tim asked.

Superboy didn’t answer the question. His hands were tucked under his arms so Tim couldn’t see them.

Tim searched the ground beneath his feet for any plant life that would work with him. He could manipulate roots and vines like Ivy, but he wasn’t as good at it as her. It took a lot more energy than listening to the green, and he was already exhausted. He would have to try to get out of this without a fight.

Superboy, however, wasn’t moving from the spot where he was hovering over the ground.

“How did you find me?” Tim asked him.

Superboy cast a shifty glance around the otherwise deserted Botanical Gardens and said, “Your heartbeat. It’s weird.”

 _Inconvenient_ , Tim thought.

“I came to make sure you weren’t up to anything illegal,” Superboy said.

“Did you run out of illegal activity in Metropolis?” Tim asked.

Superboy ignored the question and said, “What are you doing here anyway? This place is closed for the night. You’re trespassing.”

“I’m not going to destroy this place, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Tim said.

Superboy’s arms tightened around his chest, but he didn’t say anything.

“How are your hands?” Tim asked him.

For a moment Tim thought Superboy was going to ignore the question, but then he uncrossed his arms. He held his hands out just far enough so that Tim could see but not quite reach them.

They were still pretty inflamed, but he didn’t see too many blisters. The burns were healing fast.

“Wow,” Tim said. “You heal quick. Must be a Kryptonian thing.”

Superboy’s mouth twisted into a smug smile.

“Well, see you later,” Tim said.

Tim turned around and walked away, up the slope over the dead winter grass into a darker part of the Gardens. He hoped he wasn’t making a terrible miscalculation by turning his back on a Super.

Tim hadn’t been walking for very long when he heard Superboy say, “You can’t get rid of me just by walking away. I’m not going anywhere until you agree to leave this place.”

Tim looked back over his shoulder and was alarmed to find that Superboy was floating along behind him, just out of his reach. Perhaps he’d become overdependent upon being able to feel people walking across the green.

“Too bad. I’m not leaving,” Tim said.

“You will or...” Superboy said, and trailed off.

Tim felt a twinge of annoyance. He couldn’t believe that there had been even an instant when he had thought this idiot was attractive.

He couldn’t believe he still thought it now.

“Or what?” Tim asked. “You’ll try to grab me again and ruin your hands again?”

Superboy didn’t say anything.

“This is a very bad time for you to show up to bother me. I get you’re pissed because you got burned, but if you want revenge please come back later. Like next week maybe.”

Tim saw a boulder and went over to it. He climbed on top and sat down. Superboy watched him, scowling.

“What if I go to the police and tell them you’re here?” Superboy asked.

“Well, there’s two ways that can work out. Either they try to capture me alive and touch me and they die, or they decide to shoot me instead and I die,” Tim said, and cocked his head. “Which would you prefer?”

Superboy looked away, frowning, but it was a different kind of frown this time. He looked like he was still annoyed, but troubled also, and thinking it through. Maybe he wasn’t a total idiot after all.

“If the officers had the right equipment…” Superboy said.

Tim put his elbow on his knee and propped his chin up on his hand.

“The toxins can leak through clothing. Plus there’s always one idiot who ignores the warnings. So many freaks in Gotham. It’s impossible to remember how to fight them all.”

Superboy huffed and muttered, “Well, you’re right about that at least. Gotham is a mess. I don’t understand why anybody in their right mind would live here.”

“Don’t call the cops, Superboy. I don’t want to get shot and neither do I want a bunch of people trampling all over the Gardens. They have no respect for the green and would destroy it to get to me. That’s the last thing I want,” Tim said.

“I would warn them not to touch you.”

Tim raised his eyes to the foggy sky and said, “Officer Frank Poole.”

“What?” Superboy said.

“Officer Frank Poole. He was one of my…victims. His commanding officer warned him about touching me. I warned him too, but he got angry. He touched me and the toxins got into his bloodstream. He was dead in under six minutes.”

When Tim looked back down from the sky, he saw that Superboy was staring at him with wide eyes.

Tim shrugged and told him, “There’s always one idiot who doesn’t think enough before they act. All things considered, you got off pretty easy.”

Superboy’s cheeks turned pink as the insult sunk in.

“One day I’ll figure out how to catch you,” he said. “You’re pretty smug now, sitting there thinking you’re so uncatchable. But one day I’ll figure out how to do it.”

Tim gazed at him for a moment. If he was being honest, he could’ve stared at Superboy’s face for a lot longer. But he didn’t have that kind of time.

“You must hate it,” Tim said.

Superboy cocked his head.

“What are you talking about?”

“You must hate having an enemy you can’t just punch out of your way. You’ve relied on your brute strength all this time and now it can’t do anything for you,” Tim said.

Superboy’s eyes smouldered with rage.

“I’ve fought bad guys who are way more dangerous than you!”

“Then why are you wasting your time with me now?” Tim asked.

Superboy didn’t say anything. Instead, he stared at Tim.

Tim stared back. In the Gardens at night, Superboy’s bright blue eyes were dark as ink.

At last, Superboy rose into the sky. Tim watched him disappear over the tops of the trees, and a couple of seconds later, there was a crack in the distance. Superboy had left Gotham.

Tim watched the expanse of foggy sky over the trees where he had gone for a moment.

It was odd that Superboy had come back, and all alone, too. If he was truly committed to catching Tim, he should’ve brought the whole team.

It was inconvenient. It was a mystery.

But it was a mystery for another night.

Shaking his head, Tim pressed his foot to the ground and resumed listening for Harley.

* * *

Rook found Stray not far from the old rusted fence that kept the decrepit Amusement Mile blocked off from the rest of the city. In The Joker’s time, nobody had dared wander in except his henchmen and allies. Since Damian had killed The Joker, however, other villains had begun to take up residence there. It was a problem Damian’s father had been monitoring.

In the alleyway behind the old bumper car rink, Stray was interrogating Captain Boomerang. Damian listened to the conversation from a hidden perch on the roof of The House of Mirrors. There was a katana strapped to Damian’s back. It wasn’t _his_ katana, but it would do.

“Like I said, I haven’t seen her since she left the Squad eight months ago,” the man said.

“Has she sent you any odd messages recently?” Stray asked.

“To me? No, mate,” he said. “Harley Quinn is too good for the likes of me.”

“If you see her or hear anything about her, you need to contact Poison Ivy immediately,” Stray said.

“What’s in it for me?”

“Ivy not burying you in her garden.”

Captain Boomerang cackled.

“You make some compelling arguments,” he said. “Anything else, or are you going to pick my pockets too?”

“Thanks for the offer, but I think I’m good,” Stray said.

Captain Boomerang nodded at him and said, “I hope you find her.” Then walked off down the alleyway and turned a corner.

When he was gone, Damian heard Stray sigh. He turned around and walked away from Captain Boomerang, in the opposite direction toward the old Ferris wheel.

It was as if the stars were aligning to give Damian everything he needed. Stray was alone, in an abandoned part of the city that he did not know well. Damian could tell because had been following Stray for over an hour, and had watched him get lost more than once. Meanwhile, Damian knew these streets like the back of his own hand. He had memorized them two years ago when he was hunting The Joker.

Damian had read all about Stray’s techniques while he was writing his report about the incident in the department store. The man relied on his acrobatics and his ability to pull off risky jumps that others were too timid to attempt. But in this part of the city, none of the buildings were high enough for risky jumps, so Stray would have to evade him on foot. If he reached the end of the alleyway and turned right, he would walk until he stumbled upon the fenced off roller coaster and the ferris wheel. It was a dead end. Damian could trap him there.

Stray reached the end of the alley. He paused and looked both directions, and Damian held his breath. Stray turned right.

It was time. Silent as a ghost, Damian descended from the roof of The House of Mirrors and followed Stray around the corner.

Damian felt serene and single minded in a way that he hadn’t felt since he arrived in Gotham. As Rook, he never understood what his father wanted from him. But this was something he could do: find a target, follow them until the moment was right, strike.

The thief didn’t even know Damian was there. Damian followed him down the narrower pathway between old carnival booths until Stray reached the point where the road widened and split. One of the paths led to the crumbling roller coaster, which was surrounded by tall barbed wire fence. The other path lead to the metal Ferris wheel, which loomed overhead, still and dark.

Stray had made it to the dead end. He looked up at the top of the rusting Ferris wheel, and then over at the crumbling roller coaster, realizing his mistake. Then he turned around.

When he did, Damian was standing in the middle of the lane with his katana unsheathed.

Stray stopped and said, “Oh boy.”

Stray had his whip attached to his hip, but no other weapons.

“Nice sword, kid,” Stray called to him. “How long have you been following me?”

Damian was silent.

When Damian didn’t answer, Stray held up his hands in a placating gesture and said, “I had a feeling that you would be back for round two eventually, and I just want to say that I’m sorry about what happened last week. Tim and Jason were in trouble and I panicked. I shouldn’t have risked your life.”

Damian ignored him. Criminals like Stray would chew off their own feet to get out of a trap.

Stray’s frown deepened when Damian still did not respond, and he said, “Look, Harley Quinn is missing and could be hurt. I need you to not do this right now.”

“I have no sympathy for criminals,” Damian told him.

“Yeah, I was afraid you might say something like that,” Stray said.

Before Stray had a chance to say or do anything else, Damian lunged at him and attacked. Stray dodged the first swipe of Damian’s sword and had his whip out a second later. But a whip was an ineffective weapon against a blade. Damian ignored it entirely and slashed his katana again, this time at Stray’s leg. Stray dodged again, but not fast enough, and let out a grunt of pain when Damian’s blade caught flesh.

Stray backed away from Damian. He could see skin and blood through the new cut in his suit. It wasn’t a deep wound, but would sting.

Stray cracked his whip at Damian’s boots, but Damian was too fast for him and jumped out of the way.

“Are you going to kill me?” Stray said.

Damian ignored the question and attacked again.

For a couple of minutes, Damian had the upper hand. Stray was tired from walking all over the city all day and night looking for Harley Quinn, and now he was bleeding. Damian’s series of fast, furious attacks pushed him farther and farther back, closer to the base of the Ferris wheel, further trapping him in the peninsula of Amusement Mile.

He _could_ kill Stray...but somehow, the idea of taking Stray to the police was more satisfying. He wanted Stray to be exhausted and terrified, and when Stray at last realized how utterly the fight had slipped out of his control, Damian would spare him and take him to the police.

“Kid, please,” Stray grunted, pleading, but Damian ignored him again and kicked Stray’s cut leg. Stray buckled to his knees with a shout. Damian slashed his sword again, cutting Stray’s abdomen. Stray cried out and fell back. Again, the cut was shallow, but the leather split open and some blood began to seep out.

“I am not a tool that you and other villains can use against my father!” Damian said.

“I know,” Stray grunted, pressing one hand to the cut on his stomach. The other was still wrapped around the handle of his whip. “Rook—”

Whatever it was that Stray was going to say was cut off when the base of the Ferris wheel exploded.

Damian was thrown back by the gust of burning air. He lost his grip on the katana when he slammed into the ground.

Dazed, he pushed himself up. His ears were ringing and bright sparkling light whited out his vision. When he squinted, he could see enough of Stray to tell that he had also been thrown by the blast. The base of the Ferris wheel was on fire.

For a moment, Damian was too disoriented to move.

Then Stray was leaning over him, pulling him up. He was shouting something that Damian couldn’t hear. He let himself be dragged off the ground. Stray pulled him forward and Damian somehow managed make his legs bend and run over the shaking ground.

When he looked over his shoulder back at the burning Ferris wheel, he saw why the ground was shuddering. The Ferris wheel was falling. If he didn’t get out of the way he could be crushed.

Years of training snapped back to Damian. Shoving away the unhelpful hand that was attempting to drag him forward, Damian started running. He sprinted back down the pathway away from the falling Ferris wheel, back to the narrower pathway between the carnival booths. He didn’t pause to check whether or not Stray was following him.

He barely made it. There was a roar and a crack as the metal collided with the ground, crushing booths and sending wood and other debris hurtling through the air. The earth shuddered again and Damian almost tripped. Only because of his training did he manage to regain his balance and keep running.

As he ran, he noticed something dark in the corner of his eye. It was Stray. He had managed to avoid the falling Ferris wheel as well and was now running alongside Damian.

“What the hell just happened?” Stray yelled.

Damian chose a moment, changed course and attacked again. His katana was gone, but his body had been a weapon since he was a child.

“What are you doing?” Stray said, darting out of the way of his kick.

“You are going to jail!”

“We almost got crushed and this is what you’re focusing on right now?” Stray yelled.

“Your imbecilic act doesn’t fool me!” Damian said. He threw a shuriken at Stray, but the man tripped over some debris as he backed away and fell, so the shuriken missed him.

“What are you talking about?” Stray asked, scrambling to get up off the ground.

“This is your doing!” Damian said.

A laugh burst out of Stray’s mouth and he said, “Are you out of your—?”

There was another _boom!_ and glass and wood exploded out of The House of Mirrors. Damian and Stray skidded across the ground, holding up their arms to block the shower of raining shards.

When Damian finally brought his arm down and looked, he saw that the building was now a gaping maw of fire and smoke. Beside him, Stray swore loudly.

“Run!” Stray yelled.

As soon as Stray had spoken, bombs started going off inside the bumper car rink as well. Damian could hear other explosions in the distance too, ones he couldn’t see. They got louder and louder until he could hardly hear anything at all.

Damian was not so single minded as to be negligent with his own person. He wanted to catch Stray, but he didn’t want to die in an explosion either. So he turned in the direction of the fence where this decrepit part of the city ended and the rest of the city began, and ran. He would have forgotten about Stray altogether, except he turned once and saw that Stray was following him out.

Finally, when his lungs were bursting and his leg muscles were burning, he saw the gate through the smoke, and the tall buildings looming over it. Lights from police cars lit up the brick and glass on the other side, trapped out. Damian detached his grappling gun, aimed it at a building, and pulled the trigger. There was a rough jerk and he was in the air.

Damian rose over the chaos, but didn’t have the time to take it in. Only moments later, he slammed into the side of the building. There was a ledge below him, not so far up that he couldn’t land without getting hurt. He pressed the button on his grappling gun to release the hooks and then fell down to it. He landed on his side, hitting the concrete so hard that it knocked the wind out of him.

He groaned and rolled over.

Now that he was safe again, he pushed himself up and looked out over Amusement Mile. The whole expanse of it was burning, smoke and fire pouring from it as if it was a war zone. Down below him on the street, firemen and police officers were cutting through the metal fence to get through.

Stray was likely still in there.

 _Good riddance_ , Damian thought. He had wanted to take Stray to the police, but him dying in a trap of his own making was satisfying in its own way.

He was still staring out over Amusement Mile when he saw movement in his peripheral vision. He turned his head in the direction of the building across the street and saw a dark figure climbing up the fire escape.

It was Stray.

Stray paused for a moment on his way up. Damian thought perhaps Stray was looking at him, but there was a lot of smoke, and it was hard to tell for sure.

Then the man resumed climbing, heading up and away from the police.

He was getting away.

There was too much happening down below, so much smoke and light and noise. No one had the attention to spare for the man in black climbing out of the chaos. After all of that, Stray was going to escape.

Damian could not allow it.

He got up. He picked up his grappling gun, and aimed it at the building Stray was climbing. He pulled the trigger and was pulled forward off his ledge and over the street.

He was almost across when something sliced through his line.

He was reminded of the moment in the department store the previous week, in that gap of time where he seemed to be caught in mid-air. It happened again. For a moment, Damian was suspended in time, in space, in air, and the two moments merged and seemed to become one.

Then the moment ended, and he plunged down toward the concrete ground. Faces turned up, and policemen pointed. None of them were moving to help him, and this time his father was not there to catch him. Damian didn’t scream.

Seconds before he would have hit the ground, someone slammed into him and snatched him out of the air. They went up for a moment in a breathless ascent. Damian opened his eyes again just before they both collided with a balcony railing.

“Hold on!” Stray said.

Damian grabbed the concrete and held on with a death grip. When he looked up, he saw the end of Stray’s whip curled around a gargoyle.

Stray.

Someone had cut Damian’s line. He had been falling, and would have died, but Stray caught him.

As he was looking up, he saw the end of the whip come loose around the gargoyle. Stray shouted and grabbed for the railing, but didn’t move fast enough. Damian reached for him, but their hands missed each other and Damian watched, unable to do anything, as Stray fell.

They weren’t as high up anymore as they had been, and it wasn’t a long fall. Stray twisted in the air, controlling it as well as he could, and landed on top of a police car. Damian still flinched when he slammed into the metal and rolled off onto the ground.

For a few terrible seconds, Stray was limp on the street. Damian didn’t breathe again until he saw the man push himself up onto his knees.

“Hey!” someone yelled.

Some of the police officers who had been watching Damian fall were now pulling out their guns and pointing them at Stray.

“Put your hands up and don’t move!” another one of them yelled.

Stray put his hands up.

Dazed, Damian hung onto the balcony railing and watched as the police officers swarmed Stray and dragged him off the ground. One of them shoved him against the hood of a police car and cuffed him as a different officer read him his rights.

Damian had been falling. From such a height, he most likely would not have survived. He was only alive because Stray saved him.

And now Stray was finally going to jail.


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amusement Mile was on fire.
> 
> Harper pulled off her helmet and said, “Holy shit.”

Harper was looking for Harley Quinn in The Bowery like Bruce asked her to when she heard a series of beeps over the comms.

Harper was familiar with that series of beeps. Bruce had drilled the sound into her head when she first started training with him, over and over again until she occasionally started humming it without thinking. It was the emergency signal that meant she should abandon whatever it was she was doing and return to the cave immediately.

It also meant that for whatever reason, Oracle was not currently able to contact her directly.

Feeling a chill, Harper pulled out her grappling gun and returned at once to the hidden bunker where her bike was stashed. Lucky for her, The Bowery wasn’t as far from Wayne Manor. She thought she heard sirens coming from somewhere east, but it wasn’t safe to check on what was happening while she was driving, so she drove on.

She got home in just under thirty minutes. She didn’t see anybody else except Alfred, who was standing over at the computer. He had his hands clasped tightly behind his back and was watching several news channels at once up on the huge screen.

When she walked up the steps and over to him, she saw what had captured his attention so fully. Amusement Mile was on fire.

Harper pulled off her helmet and said, “Holy shit.”

“Language, Miss Harper,” Alfred said, but he said it in a distracted sort of way, almost like he didn’t notice he was saying it.

“What happened?” she asked, approaching the screen.

Alfred didn’t say anything, but since several news anchors were speaking over the footage of the fire, Harper got distracted listening to them anyway.

“— _unknown at this time who is behind the explosions that destroyed Amusement Mile and started the blaze_ — _partner witnessed at the scene, but at this time it does not appear that Batman was involved_ — _initial blast destroyed the base of the ferris wheel_ — _Batman was seen in Chinatown earlier in the evening_ — _Richard Grayson, son of John and Mary Grayson, who were murdered by Tony Zucco when he was just ten years old_ —”

Harper turned her head in the direction of the last voice, searching for the news report that was discussing Dick Grayson.

“— _For those of you just tuning in, our story tonight is about the arrest of Dick Grayson, the alleged thief and accomplice of Catwoman better known by his alias Stray. Stray’s existence has long been considered to be an urban legend in Gotham, but we have received confirmation that Stray was apprehended by the police this evening and is currently being transported to Blackgate to await trial._ ”

“Alfred,” Harper said. She nudged him with her elbow and pointed at that news report. They were playing a loop of Stray being guided into a police car. “That’s the guy who fought Damian last week.”

Alfred’s lips were twisted into a tense frown. He said, “I know.”

Her attention was pulled back to that report when she heard the news anchor say, “ _A witness at the scene captured video indicating that the vigilante known as Rook was engaged in a fight with Stray before he was arrested.”_

The nonstop footage of Stray getting pushed into the police car finally stopped and there was a dark video of two figures colliding with each other midair. It wasn’t so dark that Harper couldn’t make out Rook.

“Oh no,” Harper said.

At that moment, Harper heard the car coming down the tunnel back to the cave, and she didn’t hear whatever else was said about Rook and Stray’s fight. She turned just in time to see the car drive around the corner and pull up next to her bike.

Alfred muted the volume on the news reports as Bruce and Damian climbed out of the car. They were in the middle of an argument. Damian’s brown skin and his suit were streaked with ash, and he smelled like a bonfire, even from so far across the cave from her.

“—unbelievable levels of negligence that makes me question why I ever allowed you to become one of my partners at all,” Bruce was saying as he pulled off his cowl.

“I did everything I could have done, everything that _you_ would have done to ensure—”

“ _I_ would not have snuck out without telling anyone that I was going off alone to fight a formidable opponent. _I_ would not have gone alone, to a dangerous part of the city, without backup or resources in the first place—”

“You are constantly alone. How can you accuse me—?”

“I have Barbara and Alfred monitoring me while I am on patrol, and if they are not available then I work with Gordon or one of the girls. I am never without backup of some kind.”

Damian, apparently coming up with no rebuttal for this, said, “Stray is hardly a formidable opponent as you claim he is. Perhaps one of the Batgirls would find him a challenge, but I—”

“You almost died!”

“I do not fear death. I was trained by the League of Assassins—”

“I am well aware of who trained you,” Bruce said, sharply enough that it actually shut Damian up.

There was a horrible pause, and Damian, without another word to his father, turned and started climbing up the stairs to the second level.

“Where are you going?” Bruce asked him.

“This argument is going in circles. I have nothing further to say about the subject and no longer see the point in prolonging it,” Damian said.

Harper winced.

“This conversation is over when I say it is over,” Bruce said, following him up.

Damian halted halfway up the stairs and turned to point an accusing finger down at Bruce.

“You trained me to be a vigilante, to help you win the war against crime in Gotham!” he yelled. “I apprehended Stray, who is a criminal, and sent him to jail. I could have killed him if I wanted, but I didn’t do it because I knew _you_ would be disappointed. You should be pleased!”

“You deceived me, and Barbara, and Alfred. You were supposed to be here, at Wayne Manor, safe,” Bruce said.

“If I desired safety I would hang up the mantle of Rook and go to school with Cullen Row,” Damian said with a disdainful sniff.

Harper was so focused on the argument happening below her and Alfred that she didn’t notice the sound of the elevator bringing someone down to the cave at first. When she finally heard it, she turned back to the computer and checked the elevator’s camera.

There was a woman in the elevator in a wheelchair. Barbara. Harper could count on one hand the number of times Barbara had showed up in the cave in person.

Damian and Bruce had come up to Harper and Alfred’s level by the time the elevator door opened a moment later. Barbara emerged and came over to Bruce’s side.

“Where’s Stephanie?” Barbara asked him.

“I don’t know, but I sent her and Cass the signal too. They should be back any minute now. Why?” Bruce asked.

“Stephanie knew,” Barbara said. “She was helping Damian look for Stray. I had a hunch when I heard about what happened to Dick, so I started looking at the cameras over in her usual neighborhood and found plenty of evidence of them patrolling together over the past few days.”

Bruce, his face stonier than ever, turned to glower down at his son.

“Gordon’s information is not altogether accurate,” Damian said.

“So Stephanie wasn’t patrolling with you?”

Damian did not get a chance to answer, however, because they all heard the familiar roar of a bike coming down the tunnel. Seconds later, it came around the bend at a speed only Stephanie would attempt. As she drove up to Bruce and Damian, Harper spotted Cass behind Stephanie on the seat, arms wrapped around Stephanie’s stomach.

Stephanie turned off the bike’s engine and she and Cass climbed off it.

“Stephanie!” Bruce bellowed. “Cassandra! Get up here now!”

Harper saw Cass and Steph exchange a look, and then they climbed up the stairs to join the crowd gathered by the railing. Harper stayed with Alfred over by the computer, feeling oddly stressed over the situation, like she could get pulled into it at any moment. Which was stupid. She hadn’t even known Damian was sneaking out.

“What do you want now?” Stephane asked, pulling off her hood as she took a step toward Bruce. “I thought you wanted me to look for—”

Stephanie stopped speaking when she finally spotted Damian in his Rook suit behind Bruce.

“Uh oh,” Stephanie said. She wrinkled her nose and said, “Why do you—?”

Steph didn’t finish her sentence because Cass nudged her arm. When Stephanie looked down at her Cass pointed over toward Harper and Alfred. Stephanie looked over and her jaw dropped as she watched the news footage about Amusement Mile playing silently on the monitor behind them.

“What happened?” Stephanie asked.

“Damian left the cave alone to go fight Stray,” Bruce said. “Apparently he has been looking for him ever since his fight with Sirens’ sons at the department store last week. Except their fight got interrupted when bombs started going off at Amusement Mile, and Stray was arrested by the police.”

Stephanie, frowning, turned to look down at Damian, but she didn’t say anything. Damian had his arms crossed over his chest and was still wearing that impassive expression, but something about it looked a little off to Harper. She couldn’t explain it, but she didn’t think Damian felt as nonchalant as he was trying to appear.

“Barbara just told me that you have been helping him look for Stray,” Bruce told Stephanie.

Stephanie’s eyes snapped down at Barbara for a moment and she said, “What? I wasn’t!”

“But you were patrolling with him?” Bruce asked.

“We were out in the Diamond District a couple of times,” she said.

“And you didn’t think to tell me?”

“He was going to go out and patrol anyway,” Stephanie said, shrugging. “It’s not like you would take a break for one night to watch your damn son, and I had my own neighborhoods to patrol. At least if he was with me somebody would be watching his back.”

Bruce said, “But Stray—”

“He never said anything about Stray! He told me he wanted help looking into the graffiti—”

Abruptly, Stephanie stopped speaking. For a moment she looked thoughtful.

Then she turned back to Damian and said, “God. You wanted me to think that I was helping you look into the graffiti, but really you were looking for Stray the whole time.”

Damian didn’t say anything.

His silence, apparently, was all the confirmation she needed.

Harper wasn’t expecting it at all when Stephanie suddenly lunged at Damian.

Cass, however, was. She grabbed Stephanie around the waist before Stephanie could get any closer to him and held her back while Stephanie thrashed, furious.

“Let me go, Cass!” Stephanie said.

“No,” Cass said.

“Do you mean to fight me?” Damian asked, already in a defensive position.

Bruce moved in front of Damian and told Stephanie, “No one is fighting anyone.”

“You lied to me!” Stephanie said, ignoring Bruce.

“You are not obligated to know all of my plans at all times, and having you investigate the graffiti for me was not altogether a ruse. I was interested in the graffiti as well,” Damian said.

Stephanie laughed and said, “You unbelievable sneaky little shit.”

“You, like the others, were defensive of Stray. I knew you would not approve if I told you that I planned to apprehend him no matter what arguments I made in defense of my objective.”

Bruce turned suddenly to look down at his son and said, “And you never stopped to consider at any point tonight that you were attacking someone who was not in the process of committing a crime, while he was searching for someone who is missing, potentially dead?”

Damian didn’t say anything.

“Now Amusement Mile is in flames and Richard Grayson is going to jail for saving your life,” Bruce said in his silence.

There was a hard beat where nobody spoke. Harper was so confused about what had happened tonight, but she didn’t dare remind any of them she was there for fear she would get sent away.

“He did not need to do it,” Damian finally said. “He could have escaped. There was no way I could have stopped him.”

“He saved your life,” Bruce said.

“A choice he made by his own volition. Now he must suffer the consequences.”

“Jesus Christ,” Stephanie said. “You’re a sociopath, you know that?”

She finally managed to shake Cass off. Without another word, she turned and headed for the stairs back down to their vehicles and the tunnel out of the cave.

“Stephanie, where are you going?” Bruce asked, watching her go.

“Away from this cursed cave,” she said as she headed down. “You would think I would’ve learned my lesson about trusting a Wayne ages ago, and yet here I am.”

“We aren’t done yet,” Bruce said.

“Yes we are,” Stephanie said, pulling her hood back over her head. “I no longer consider myself part of this team.”

Harper moved to stop her, but Alfred grabbed her shoulder and held her back.

Stephanie climbed back on the bike and turned on the engine.

“Stephanie!” Bruce said, starting to follow her down, but Stephanie either couldn’t hear him or was ignoring him. She hit the gas and spun out of the cave, so loud that for a second all Harper could hear was the squealing of her tires and the roar of the bike’s engine.

Then Stephanie was gone.

Bruce looked at the tunnel, then back up at Damian. There was a long, terrifying silence as Bruce stared at his son, unblinking. Then Bruce turned away and pulled his cowl back over his head.

“Where are you going?” Damian asked.

“There could be people trapped in Amusement Mile,” Bruce said. “Harley Quinn is still missing, and I need to speak to Gordon about Stray. Cassandra and Harper, come with me. Alfred, do not let Damian out of your sight.”

“Of course, Master Bruce,” Alfred said.

Bruce climbed down the stairs to the car and didn’t even bother sparing Damian another look. Harper did, though. She put on her helmet again and went down to join Bruce at the car, and for the rest of the night she couldn’t stop thinking about the stricken expression she had seen on Damian’s face as he watched them leave. For the first time Harper could remember, he had looked young, and lost, and fragile—like a real boy after all.

* * *

It was sometime around 1 a.m. and Jason was just coming out of one of Harley’s usual dives, frustrated all over again for still not having found her. A guy in a leather jacket was leaning up against the building smoking a cigarette. When he looked down and saw Jack of Clubs coming toward him, he immediately pushed away from the wall and got out of his way. Jack of Clubs wasn’t out looking for any fights, though. All Jason could think about was Harley and how tired he was.

He was tired for sure, but he wasn’t so tired that he didn’t recognize the shiny black car parked across the street, or the big guy in the shitty suit leaning up against it.

“Fuck,” Jason said. “This again? I’m not in the mood.”

“Hello Mr. Todd,” the guy said, and opened the car door. “Mr. Sionis would like a word with you.”

Jason breathed out several more swear words under his breath, then crossed the street and threw himself into the car.

Black Mask was sitting on the other end of the seat, legs spread to take up as much room as possible. He looked over at Jason, gave his Jack of Clubs suit an up and down look, then said, “Close the door.”

The big guy shut the car door. Jason eyed the driver, but he stared straight ahead at the street like he was dead to the world.

“You know, if you keep coming to pick me up in your car like this, people are going to get the wrong idea about me,” Jason said.

Black Mask laughed. Jason took advantage of his momentary distraction and checked out the street. Except for the driver and the big guy waiting outside the car, Jason didn’t see anybody else who looked like they might be one of Black Mask’s associates.

“What do you want now?” Jason asked him.

“I came to find out if you’ve thought about my offer.”

“I’ve been a little busy,” Jason said.

“I heard,” Black Mask said conversationally. “Harley gone missing. Catwoman’s little kitten arrested. It’s a big day for the Gotham City Sirens. Or should I say big night?”

Jason’s wandering gaze snapped back over to him.

“What was that about Catwoman?”

“You haven’t heard?” Black Mask asked. “Stray was arrested tonight. There was some kind of mess over at Amusement Mile. I heard Batman’s little accident was involved somehow. Stray has been sent to Blackgate to await trial.”

Jason couldn’t get his mouth to work for a minute. He wasn’t entirely convinced the whole situation wasn’t a nightmarish figment of his exhausted imagination.

“You're lying. You’re just saying this to rattle me.”

“Why would I lie? I want you to work for me, kid. When was the last time you checked in with your family?” Black Mask asked.

“Phone died hours ago.”

“Then you can borrow mine,” Black Mask said.

Black Mask pulled his phone out of the interior pocket of his jacket and tapped at it for a moment. Then he handed it to Jason and Jason stared down at the screen.

The big headline on _The Gotham Times_ website read, _Catwoman Accomplice Stray Caught._ Jason read the first paragraph, just enough to see the words Dick Grayson and Rook. Then he turned the screen off and handed the phone back to Black Mask.

Black Mask gave him a minute to absorb the news. It wasn’t possible. Dick never got caught. Not even Batman could catch him. How could the little bastard Batkid have been the one to finally get him?

Jason’s first impulse was to call Harley. Then he remembered all over again that Harley was missing, that he couldn’t find her. He stared out the street, momentarily feeling as vacant as Black Mask’s driver looked.

“Sorry to be the bearer of bad news,” Black Mask said.

“Funny. You don’t sound that sorry,” Jason said.

“He was a friend?”

“Don’t say _was_ like he’s dead. I’m going to get him out. There’s no way Catwoman will let this happen. I’m going to go find her and we’ll get him out.”

Black Mask hummed and said, “Maybe.”

Jason turned back to Black Mask and narrowed his eyes. He hated that stupid fucking mask, and the fact that he couldn’t see what the guy was thinking. Maybe he'd been too hasty before, when he'd dismissed Black Mask and decided he couldn't be involved in everything that was going on. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jason asked him.

“Pardon?”

“I said I was going to get him out and you said maybe. You know something I don’t know?”

“Well, this is Blackgate we’re talking about,” Black Mask said. “Getting someone out isn't easy. I would know.”

“You know what I think?” Jason asked. "I think everything that comes out of your mouth is complete bullshit." 

Black Mask chuckled.

“So you're going to get him out. In the meantime, would it be comforting to know that there are people in Blackgate looking out for him?” he asked. 

Jason almost wished he wasn’t wearing his own mask so that Sionis would be able to see the malice in his eyes.

“I can’t give you any kind of answer until Harley is found,” Jason said.

“Then consider it a favor until then. I’ll have my associates look out for your Cat friend while he’s on the inside. I hope you’ll remember this kindness when you’re making your decision about working for me.”

“Are we done now?” Jason asked.

“You need a ride?”

“There are still places left to look in this neighborhood,” Jason said, and then he didn’t wait to be dismissed. He climbed out of the car and slammed the door shut behind him.

Black Mask must’ve been in a good mood, because he didn’t have his employee shoot Jason in the back for the insolence. Jason walked across the deserted street, then safely into an alley, through the light over a building’s back door. He didn’t turn around to look when he heard Black Mask’s car pull away from the curb and drive off.

For a minute after Black Mask was gone he was actually relieved, and so staggered by it that he almost swayed right into a wall. Then his tired brain looped back around to Harley again, and then Dick, and the anxiety slammed right back into him, along with a wave of dizziness. He had to put a hand up against the wall so as not to fall over.

“Batman?”

Jason whirled around. Maybe he moved too fast or something, because his vision started sparkling.

“Who’s there?” he said. “Don’t sneak up on me. That is not a good idea.”

A woman stepped out of the shadows into the light shining down over the door.

Jason took an involuntary step back.

The woman was a wreck. Her clothes were filthy, and her hair so matted and dirty that it was impossible to tell the natural color. She wasn’t dressed anywhere near warmly enough for the frigid night.

The scar was what really got him, though. It was huge, almost an inch thick. It ran down the left side of her face, spilling over her chin and on down her neck, until it disappeared under the collar of her loose jacket.

“Batman?” she said, taking another step toward him.

“Sorry,” Jason said, holding out his hands in front of him. “You’ve got the wrong guy in the wrong black suit.”

The woman, undeterred, took another step toward him. She was looking and more and more distraught by the minute as she gazed up at him, her expression twisted in anguish.

“Batman,” she said again, and then she collapsed in his arms.

“Whoa, no!” Jason said, but somehow found himself catching her anyway. She went deadweight, and while he would’ve been able to hold her up normally, he was way too tired to do it now. She dragged him down so they were kneeling on the filthy concrete, then dug her nails into the back of his suit and burst into tears.

_Great_ , Jason thought to himself, as he awkwardly patted her on the back. A drunk woman in an alley thought he was Batman and was now crying all over him. Because he didn’t currently have enough problems.

Except she didn’t smell drunk. She smelled bad for sure, musky like someone who hadn’t showered in a while, but not like alcohol. Probably a junkie, then.

After a minute, the woman recovered enough that she started picking at different parts of his suit. She made it up to his shoulders, then his neck, then his face. She started feeling the top of his head, running her grubby fingers through his hair like she was feeling around for something. She was shivering pretty bad.

“Like I said, not Batman,” he said. “I never went for pointy ears.”

She let go of his hair and got her hands around the white mask over his mouth instead. She started pulling on it.

“Please don’t do that,” he said, and tried to peel her hands away.

She did not like this at all. One minute he was gently pulling her hand away from his face like a gentleman, then the next she had his hand in some kind of ninja hold and was bending it back so far he thought it the bone was going to snap.

“Ok!” he said. “Uncle! Stop! I’m sorry.”

She held on for another excruciating second, then some kind of switch flicked, and her eyes went unfocused and wide like she suddenly wasn’t all there. She let go of him at last. Jason gasped with relief as she got back up to her feet, looking as thin and shaky as a newborn deer.

Jason rubbed his aching hand while she wandered a little bit down the alleyway.

“Hey,” he said. “Where are you going?”

The woman stopped in the middle of the alleyway, but she didn’t turn around. She just...stood there.

For a while Jason stayed kneeling on the ground, thinking through his options.

As much as he wanted to find Harley, he needed to sleep, or he was going to get himself caught by the cops. Or someone worse than the cops. He thought about Black Mask again for a minute, how easy it had been for Black Mask to track him down. He was getting sloppy.

The woman, on the other hand, wasn’t his problem. Gotham was crawling poor souls living in alleyways and shivering under boxes. Jason couldn’t possibly help them all, and his throbbing hand was evidence enough that she could look out for herself.

But then again…

It was clear there was something the matter with her. The fact that she thought he was Batman was his first clue. Maybe her vision was bad? And then there was the way she’d gone blank all the sudden, like she totally forgot he was there. Maybe she could fight off someone his size, but that didn’t mean she knew where to find shelter. Heavy clouds had been creeping over the city all night, and there was a particular bite to the air that threatened snow. If he left her out in the alleyway, there was a good chance she would die of exposure.

Jason groaned and rubbed his hand over his mask. Then he got to his feet. The woman stayed still in the middle of the alleyway like she couldn’t hear him.

“I’m probably going to regret this,” he said.

He stepped over to the woman’s side, going slow, but she kept staring down the alleyway. It was like she’d totally forgotten he was there.

“Don’t hurt me again, ok?” he said.

He reached out and touched her arm.

At the contact, she looked over at his hand, then up at his face again.

“Batman,” she said.

“I’m still not him,” he said, “but at least I can get you out of this cold, right?”

* * *

When Batman arrived on the roof, the signal was still on, but he didn’t see Gordon. He didn’t see any officers at all, and fat snowflakes were just starting to drift down from the sky.

Gordon was supposed to be at home, resting. Amusement Mile’s flames had finally been extinguished, and Dick Grayson was being watched at Blackgate by a whole team of policemen.

So this was something else. Not Gordon.

Batman turned to look behind him, eyeing the buildings surrounding the GCPD headquarters.

As soon as he’d turned, he heard a familiar crackling sound behind him. Then the signal shut off and the rooftop suddenly got a lot darker.

He turned back around and saw Ivy step out from behind it. Her vines were coiling up over the spotlight, climbing the metal.

He braced himself for an attack, but he thought it was unlikely Ivy would provoke a physical altercation. There were dark circles around Ivy’s eyes, and she was holding onto the signal as if for support. The vines crawling up and over it were more sluggish than what Ivy could do at the height of her power.

“That signal is not a toy,” he told her.

“It was the only way I could think to get your immediate attention,” she said.

“I already know all about Harley. Catwoman told me last night. Batgirl and Black Bat are helping look for her as we speak.”

“I figured she’d tell you about Harley, but that’s not why I’m here,” Ivy said.

“There is nothing I can do for Dick Grayson at the moment.”

“He’s not why I’m here either. I think he may be safer in Blackgate right now than we are out here.”

“What are you talking about?” Batman asked.

“It’s Selina. First Harley, and now Selina,” Ivy said. “I can’t find her anywhere.”


	12. Chapter Twelve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Do you know what happened back then?” he asked. “Back when Stephanie was Batgirl, I mean. You looked at her file, right?”
> 
> If there was one thing Cullen knew about his sister, it was that she couldn’t help but stick her nose in a mystery. When he saw her glance over at the dark empty hallway beyond her room, he was certain she knew.
> 
> Without a word, she got up and shut her door.
> 
> “I don’t think I should tell you,” she said, coming back over to him and leaning against one of the bedposts.
> 
> “Come on, Harper. I can’t figure out how to help you help her unless you tell me.”

Cullen waited until 11 to go upstairs and knock on Harper’s door. When she didn’t tell him to come in and he didn’t hear any other sounds of activity, he pushed the door open a little and peeked inside.

Harper was, in fact, in her room. She was sprawled across the top of her bed, face down on top of the blankets. She was so still that for an alarming moment she looked dead.

“Harper?” Cullen whispered.

Harper didn’t move.

Cullen pushed the door the rest of the way open with one of his crutches and went over to the bed.

“Harper?” he said, a little louder this time.

Nothing.

He reached out a hand and shook her shoulder.

He was gentle, but he heard the sharp exhalation of her breath. Before he had a chance to back off, she was shooting up and striking him in the shoulder. Cullen let out a shout of alarm and caught a glimpse of her furious expression before he fell backwards onto his butt.

The furious expression turned into shock when she realized it was just him.

“Cullen? Oh god, I’m so sorry!”

She scrambled off the bed and down to the floor to help him.

“I’m good,” he said, putting up a hand to stop her. “I can get up. Just give me a minute.”

Harper hovered nearby while Cullen used the armchair on the other side of her bedside table to pull himself back up. He felt shaky enough that he didn’t want to try to stand up again just yet, so he sat down on the chair and left his crutches on the ground.

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

“It’s ok,” he said. “I wasn’t trying to scare you, honest. I said your name but you didn’t wake up.”

Harper got up and sat down on the bed. Even in the late morning light, her skin looked washed out. She was thinner than usual too. He made a mental note to mention to Alfred later that she needed to increase her caloric intake.

“What’s up?” she said.

“It snowed last night. I thought you might want to see it,” he said.

“I know. It started snowing last night when I was out on patrol.”

“Oh, right.” Harper saw everything and knew everything before he did.

“But it’s different seeing it in daylight, I guess,” Harper said. The mattress squeaked under her as she crawled to the head of the bed to look out the window and over the grounds of Wayne Manor.

“I see footprints,” she said. “Alfred took the dog for a walk.”

Cullen didn’t say anything, but watched her look out. She smiled, and for a moment she looked contented, more like the old Harper he remembered.

“Hey Harper?” he said.

Harper looked over at him.

“Did something happen last night?” he asked. “You got home so late. Stephanie didn’t come home at all.”

Harper frowned.

“Steph left,” she said. “Alfred didn’t tell you?”

“I haven’t seen him except for maybe five minutes at breakfast. He’s been with Damian all morning.”

Harper nodded and slumped back down onto the bed.

“What happened?” he asked.

“It’s a long story. And I’m not even sure if I know exactly what happened,” she said.

“Tell me anyway,” he said.

Harper sighed and told him what she overheard about Damian, Stephanie, Stray, and Amusement Mile. Cullen had picked up bits and pieces of what the public knew from looking at his phone earlier, so together they pieced the story more or less together.

“Stephanie said that she knew better than to trust a Wayne and then she got on her bike and she left. I have no idea where she went and she’s not answering any of my texts,” Harper said.

She stopped talking and looked down at her hands. She was picking with a loose string on one of her old quilts. It had come from the apartment where they lived before Mr. Wayne took them in, and looked pretty shabby compared to the rest of the room, but Cullen knew she wouldn’t give it up.

“I feel like it’s kind of my fault,” she said quietly.

Cullen frowned at her and said, “How would it be your fault?”

“When I first tracked Spoiler down, one of the first things she told me was that she had no interest in getting mixed up with Batman again. She said she would help me find him, but that was it. Then somehow she ended up getting pulled back into everything anyway. Now she’s upset and she hates all of us. I could’ve left her out of it like she wanted, but...I think in some way maybe I did want to fix it,” Harper said.

Cullen didn’t say it wasn’t her fault, even though he didn’t think it was.

“Do you know what happened back then?” he asked. “Back when Stephanie was Batgirl, I mean. You looked at her file, right?”

If there was one thing Cullen knew about his sister, it was that she couldn’t help but stick her nose in a mystery. When he saw her glance over at the dark empty hallway beyond her room, he was certain she knew.

Without a word, she got up and shut her door.

“I don’t think I should tell you,” she said, coming back over to him and leaning against one of the bedposts.

“Come on, Harper. I can’t figure out how to help you help her unless you tell me.”

She looked back at the door one last time, and when she turned back around again, a subtle shift had come over her. She stood up straight, and her gaze was sharper. This wasn’t just Harper Row all of the sudden—this was Batgirl.

“Stephanie had been Batgirl for a little under a year and it was not going well. She was good at it, but she and Bruce fought all the time,” Harper told him.

_They still fight all the time_ , Cullen thought, but he didn’t say it.

“One night—February 8th—Batman was out looking for Scarecrow when Oracle told him that Cluemaster had resurfaced in Gotham. He was robbing a bank down in Chinatown with three accomplices. Stephanie had fought her father before and won. Batman thought that she should be able to handle him a second time and told her to go after him. He said he would join her if he managed to track down Scarecrow.”

Harper started to pace back and forth across the room.

“Under ordinary circumstances, Stephanie probably could have handled Cluemaster just fine. But she hadn’t told him that she cracked a rib while fighting Killer Croc three nights before. Instead of fessing up, she went alone to go apprehend her dad and his accomplices.

“Unfortunately, It turned out that the whole scene at the bank was a sham. Cluemaster wanted to lure her and Batman out because he was trying to expose them as Bruce Wayne and Stephanie Brown. He wanted revenge because they sent him to prison, and he was willing to hurt Stephanie to get it. She was able to incapacitate his accomplices, but not her dad. She tried to fight him, but since she was already injured, he got the upper hand. He was going to kill her. She found a gun that had been dropped by one of his accomplices and she shot him. By the time Batman and the police arrived, he’d bled out, and Stephanie was gone.”

Her story done, Harper stopped pacing. Cullen was silent as he thought it over.

“Why did she run?” Cullen asked. “She had to know Batman would find her.”

“She probably did. I guess she panicked.”

“Were there witnesses? Who was at the bank? Maybe she didn’t kill him. Maybe she was set up,” Cullen said.

Harper shook her head and tapped a finger next to her eye.

“Barbara installed cameras in the Batgirl domino and the Batman cowl after Joker murdered Carrie. She watched the whole fight between Stephanie and Cluemaster go down live,” Harper said grimly.

“You watched the footage,” Cullen said. “Didn’t you?”

Harper nodded, and Cullen hissed out a breath. He couldn’t imagine watching something like that. There was a good reason he didn’t get mixed up in all of the Bat stuff. He didn’t have the stomach for it.

Cullen thought over the story again, tapping his fingers on the armrests. Harper watched him and chewed on her lower lip.

“Why didn’t she tell him about the broken rib?” Cullen asked. “He would’ve understood.”

Harper shook her head and said, “I don’t know. Babs figured it out pretty fast while she was watching the fight, but Stephanie wouldn’t retreat, even when Babs told her to. And afterwards, when Batman tracked her down, he asked Stephanie why she didn’t tell him she was already hurt, but she wouldn’t explain. She just kept telling him to leave. It was in the file.”

“So did she get fired? Or did she quit?” Cullen asked.

“I don’t know. That part wasn’t in the file. But she definitely talks about it like he fired her,” Harper said.

“What does Cass say?”

“About this?” Harper said. “Nothing. No one talks about it. Everyone pretends like it didn’t happen, except it’s painfully obvious that everyone thinks about it all the time.”

“Well, that just proves it then,” Cullen said.

“Proves what?”

“That it’s not your fault.”

Harper sighed again, and he could hear the argument coming before she even said a word, so he said, “Hear me out. You said that Stephanie told you she didn’t want to get mixed up with Batman again, but she came back anyway. And you and I both know there’s no way Mr. Wayne would let anybody in the cave unless he wanted them to be there. I think they want to fix what happened, but they’re just too emotionally constipated to know how to do that, so something was bound to blow up between them eventually. If anything, you finding Spoiler and asking her to contact Batman for you gave them the excuse they needed to stop pretending the other didn’t exist.”

Harper considered this for a minute and then said, “So what do I do?”

Cullen frowned and said, “It doesn’t sound like there is anything you can do this time. This is something Stephanie and Mr. Wayne will have to work out on their own.”

Harper walked back over to the bed. He watched her fall back onto the mattress and gaze up at the ceiling.

She looked miserable, but Cullen also thought maybe she looked a little less tense, like some of the weight of the world had been taken off her shoulders.

“I do have one last question,” Cullen said.

“What?”

“I asked Alfred why Superboy and Wonder Girl and the others came here. He said that they asked you to join Young Justice and you said no. Why did you say no?” Cullen asked.

Harper sighed and closed her eyes. She probably needed to go back to sleep—he felt bad for waking her in the first place.

“I didn’t think it was fair to you to say yes,” she said.

“Fair to me?” Cullen said, and pointed at himself even though she still had her eyes closed. “Why wouldn’t it be fair to me?”

“I never meant to become Batgirl. I was just trying to save you. Now I’m Batgirl, and I’m busy all the time, and we hardly ever see each other, and I feel like you—”

“Harper,” Cullen said, interrupting her. “You saved my life. And you save other people everyday.  You’re Batgirl. That’s important to Gotham. That’s important to the world. If you want to join Young Justice, then join Young Justice.”

Harper sighed and said, “You say that now.”

“I say that now and I would say it ten years from now too,” Cullen said. “Look, I may not want to get mixed up in all of the capes nonsense, but that doesn’t mean I begrudge _you_ for getting mixed up in it.”

Harper opened her eyes and said, “Really?”

“Yeah,” Cullen said. He finally grabbed his crutches and grunted as he got to his feet. “You’re Batgirl now, but you’ll always be my sister, even if you’re a little busy sometimes. I promise.”

Harper looked up at him and smiled.

“Thank you Cullen,” she said.

“What are brothers for?” he said. “Get some sleep. You look like you need it.”

* * *

Jason’s hideout was an apartment in an abandoned building over in Robbinsville. Tim climbed through the window into the kitchen, then shut it behind him.

Tim looked around. It was barely noon, but still outcast and snowing outside, so it seemed much later. The furniture in the dim apartment was sparse and had clearly been picked up in random places, but everything was neat and clean. Jason tended to be that way. Tim couldn’t keep up with him in that regard—he found tidiness exhausting.

Jason’s spiked club had been set on top of the kitchen counter. His mask was sitting on top of an old square folding table. Bits of his black suit were draped over the back of a chair.

One thing he did not see was Jason.

“Jason?” he said.

There was no response.

Tim wandered out of the kitchen and into the den.

In the den Tim found Jason...and someone else.

Jason was asleep on the floor next to the futon. On top of the futon there was a different person. Tim saw tufts of hair peeking out from under a blanket, and one thin dirty arm wrapped around a pillow.

Tim jabbed Jason in the leg with his foot, and Jason woke with a gasp.

“Fuck,” Jason said.

He rolled over and gazed blearily up at Tim. He had a black eye. Not that Jason was any stranger to black eyes, but it was still concerning considering everything that was going on.

“Tim?” Jason said.

“Hey,” Tim said.

Jason sat up a little further and looked around the apartment.

“What are you doing here?” Jason asked him.

“Looking for you,” Tim said.

“You’re not supposed to know about this place.”

“I’m not?”

Jason sighed and closed his eyes, rolling back over into the nest of blankets he’d made for himself on the floor.

“You need to get up,” Tim said.

“Fuck off.”

“Harley is still missing. Dick got arrested. We should probably go find Ivy, figure out what we’re going to do next. Also, I would also like to know who this is,” Tim said. He pointed at the body under the blankets even though Jason had turned over and couldn’t see him.

“Who—oh, shit,” Jason said.

Jason sat up and leaned over the shape on the futon.

“Hey, ma’am?” Jason said.

The bundle didn’t move. After a minute of waiting, Jason reached out and lightly pushed on a spot that was probably a shoulder.

Her reaction was immediate. Jason scrambled back as she jerked up. She didn’t get far because her legs were tangled in the blankets, so the time she managed to get her legs free, Jason was on his feet next to Tim.

She pulled a blanket off her head, revealing the full head of matted hair. Tim’s stomach lurched a little as he took in the massive scar on her face.

“Hey,” Jason said to her. “Good morning. How are you doing?”

The woman stared at them. She was breathing pretty hard. But even though they waited, she didn’t say anything.

“She can’t really talk,” Jason told Tim.

“Can’t really talk?” Tim said.

“She found me last night. She saw me in my Jack of Clubs suit and thought I was Batman. She can say Batman, but she hasn’t said anything else.”

Tim figured from the way that Jason was discussing her right in front of her face that she wasn’t all there.

“What happened to her?” he asked.

“No idea. She’s got some shit figured out. She did this last night when I was trying to herd her back here”—Jason pointed to his black eye—“but she can’t tell me what she was doing out in the alleyway where I found her. Or where she found me, or whatever. I don’t even know if she knows her own name.”

While Jason talked, the woman seemed to lose interest in them. Her eyes got glassy and she started blinking slowly like it was hard to keep her eyes open.

“Huh,” Tim said. “Interesting.”

“I know,” Jason said.

“And what compelled you to take an interest in her in the middle of Harley’s disappearance?” Tim asked.

“Well, I couldn’t just fucking leave her out in an alleyway,” Jason said. “It started snowing while we were coming back here.”

Tim sighed.

The woman’s unfocused gaze traveled back around to them again. When it landed on Tim, something about her expression sharpened again. She pulled the blanket off from over her legs and got to her feet.

She was very thin. She must’ve been out on the streets for a while. For some reason he wasn’t expecting her to reach out to try to touch him.

“Whoa, no!” Jason said, getting between them as Tim backed away. Jason batted at her hand.

She didn’t like this at all. Her face twisted up with rage and she advanced on Jason like she meant to hit him.

Jason pointed at her and said, “Not this shit again, alright? I’m not in the mood for a fucking brawl. We don’t touch Tim. That is a very bad idea.”

For a minute Tim thought she was going to try to fight Jason anyway.

...But then her attention drifted off again. She wandered back over to the futon and slumped down. Tim watched her wince and grab her head.

Jason hissed out a breath and said, “She’s got a bit of a temper.”

“I can tell. What are you going to do with her?”

“What do you mean, what am I going to do with her?” Jason asked. “She’s not a dog.”

Tim didn’t say anything. Sometimes with Jason it was better to be silent, to refuse to engage in an argument no matter how much he wanted one.

Eventually Jason sighed and said, “Look, I know. It was late, I was exhausted. Bringing her back here seemed like a good idea at the time.”

All things considered, Tim wasn’t really that surprised. Jason was always picking up strays. There was one girl in particular who came into town every once in a while—Sasha, who got all messed up by Professor Pyg. Jason was very fond of Sasha. He acted like her big brother and Sasha reveled in it.

That didn’t mean Tim was going to sit by and be ok with it if Jason decided to sit around babysitting this new stray while their lives were falling apart.

“She probably would’ve died if you left her,” Tim said, “but we have other problems right now.”

The woman was sitting on the futon, staring at a blank stretch of wall. It was like she couldn’t even hear them.

“I hope you’re not about to say we should usher her out the door and say goodbye,” Jason said.

“What about that doctor over in Crime Alley?” Tim said. “The one who helps people like us.”

“Dr. Thompkins,” Jason said.

Tim knew that Harley took Jason to Dr. Thompkins when Joker shot him.

“We can get her some new clothes,” Tim said. She was currently wearing one of Jason’s huge college sweatshirts, and it looked like a tent on her. Also, she smelled terrible. “And a shower, and some food. After dark, we can take her to Dr. Thompkins. In the meantime, I can stay here and work on locating Harley the old fashioned way.”

“The old fashioned way?”

“With a computer,” Tim said. “This is where you come after school sometimes right? I was kind of counting on your computer being here.”

Jason muttered something under his breath about Tim being a little stalker, but finally nodded and said, “Yeah, my computer is here.”

“Good,” Tim said. “I’m not getting anything from the green, and now that it’s snowing I’m able to hear less and less. Hey, have you heard from Ivy?”

Jason shook his head.

“Me either,” Tim said. “I’ll try again.”

Jason looked over at the woman again.

“She’s not going to like being moved. It takes an eon to get her anywhere,” Jason said.  

“Like I said,” Tim said, looking up at him and raising his eyebrows. “We have other problems. All things considered, taking her to Dr. Thompkins is more than what most people would do for her.”

“Tim Drake, spirit of charitable giving,” Jason muttered.

Tim glared at him.

“Ok, fine! Fuck, stop looking at me like that. I know, it’s just...I was searching for hours and I couldn’t find anything. Everyone I talked to said they hadn’t seen Harley in weeks. It’s like she just vanished off the face of the earth.”

Jason rubbed his hands over his face, and Tim frowned grimly. It was much the same with the green. He was able to pick up bits and pieces of Ivy, Dick, and Jason going around the city asking about her, but nothing else.

“Where haven’t you looked?” Tim asked.

Jason’s shoulders tensed and he said, “Arkham Island.”

“Shit,” Tim said.

“Yeah,” Jason said. “It’s going to be a great time.”

“Well,” Tim said, raising an eyebrow. “I’ll figure out how to get us there.”

Jason grunted and said, “I’m starving. Hey miss?”

The woman looked up.

“Hungry?” he said.

She stared at him.

Finally, as Jason and Tim watched her, she nodded.

“Good. Progress,” Jason said, sounding pleased.

He warned Tim not to let her get too close, and then he went into the other room to change out of the rest of his Jack of Clubs suit.

* * *

Damian couldn’t think of anything else to do, so he sat in one of the Manor’s sitting rooms with Titus and Puck and watched the news coverage about Stray. There was no potential for getting out again. Pennyworth was no doubt watching him on the cameras at that moment, and his Rook suit had been taken away from him. He didn’t know when or if he would ever get it back.

It was unusual, and unfortunate, that so many people seemed to be more intrigued by Stray’s arrest than they were by the destruction of Amusement Mile. His capture—and Damian’s involvement in it—was being analyzed and picked apart and speculated about by the media, although most of what people thought happened was incorrect.

The one detail that people did have correct was that it was his fault.

“ _It happens every time there’s some kind of major disaster_ ,” said a man on the TV. _“The old wounds get reopened and people start asking themselves, ‘Is Batman doing more harm than good?’ Rook may have caught the alleged Stray, but was it worth it if it turns out it was at the expense of Amusement Mile?”_

On his lap, Titus huffed and scooted farther onto his lap. Puck was sitting on the back of the couch over his shoulder, purring. He knew it was childish to cling to the affection of animals for comfort, but couldn’t bring himself to send them away.

“ _The elephant in the room is Rook himself_ ,” Vicki Vale said. “ _Maybe he did catch Stray. We know Batman has allegedly worked with some young partners before. But I have seen Rook with my own eyes. He’s barely five feet tall, maybe 90 pounds soaking wet. If I had to guess, I would say he’s ten years old_.”

Damian’s hands curled into fists.

“ _How long are the people of Gotham going to ignore the fact that Batman has children fighting the likes of Professor Pyg and Victor Zsasz? He’s gotten one of the Batgirls killed before and it’s only a matter of time_ —”

The TV suddenly powered off, so Damian didn’t get to hear the rest of the her sentence. He could guess how it ended, however.

When he turned around, it was to find Cassandra standing behind the couch. She had the remote in her hand.

“I was watching that program,” he said.

“I know,” she said, nodding. “TV for hours.”

Damian looked away from her and glared at the dark TV, still stroking Titus’s dark head.

Cassandra came around the couch. She sat down on the other end.  

“I do not wish to speak to anyone,” Damian said.

“Fine. I am not good at...speaking,” Cassandra said.

Puck let out a soft little meow. He got up, stretched, and wandered over to Cassandra’s side of the couch, bumping his head against her forehead in a request for attention. Cassandra ran a hand along his smooth fur and Puck purred.

_Traitor,_ Damian thought.

“Fix it,” Cassandra said.

Damian looked at her. She was staring steadily at him, not quite frowning, but not quite smiling either. He had always found her exceedingly difficult to read.

“I achieved what I meant to achieve,” he said.

“No,” she said.

Anger bubbled up in his chest, but he knew a fight with Cassandra would be unwise. She alone had trained as long as him, and the methods used to instruct her had perhaps in some ways been more effective than the ones used to train him. He would never admit that out loud, but necessity meant he had to admit it to himself.

Also, his father was already furious with him. Fighting Cassandra would only serve to make him more angry.

“Do not presume to understand my motives just because of your unique upbringing,” Damian told her.

“Fix it,” she said.

“There is nothing to fix and nothing I can do,” he said, so sharply that Titus flinched under his hand. “Richard Grayson is in jail, under constant surveillance. His secret is exposed. It is done.”

“No,” Cass said. “Apologize. To Stephanie. To Batman.”

“I won’t,” he snarled.

“You want to,” she said. “I can see. You know...now. You...understand. Don’t want to understand. But you do.”

Damian glared at her and said, “You are not making any sense.”

“Yes I am. You understand.”

Damian turned his head away from her, so that he couldn’t see her even in his peripheral vision.

He stared at the floor and scratched Titus’s head.

“I...am more,” Cassandra said. “Chose to be more. I...decided fast. You too. There is still...time to chose. For them. The Sirens and their sons. Now you see.”

“Richard Grayson is a criminal. I do not care what happens to him.”

“Yes you do. Batman too.”

“Maybe that is his mistake,” Damian snapped. “Maybe that is why my Father cannot save Gotham. He is unable to see that there are some people who have gone too far. There are some people who cannot be saved.”

“To save Gotham...you save criminals too. Give them a...chance to choose,” she said. “That is what Batman is. A chance to be more.”

He heard her stand up.

“I do not understand why he did it,” Damian said.

“Stray?” she said.

“No. My father. He has never trusted me. He has never liked me, not since the day I first arrived in Gotham. He thinks that my mother and grandfather damaged me,” Damian said.

He didn’t know why he said it. It was embarrassing, and he could hear his own whiny, babyish voice, but it was as if the admission had been pulled out of him with some sort of sorcery. He couldn’t look at her.

“He doesn’t.”

“He hates me. He never wanted me and he wishes I would leave,” Damian said.

“He...loves you. He loves all of us,” Cassandra said. “Bad at saying it. Bad at words. But he does.”

“Why did he let me become Rook?” Damian asked.

“I...told him,” Cassandra said. “I said he…I told him to.”

Damian looked up at her at last.

She smiled at him.

“You?” he said. “Why?”

“So you can be more,” she said.

* * *

The streets of Gotham were hushed and covered in a layer of dirty snow. It had stopped snowing for a little while during the afternoon, but now that it was dark again flakes were drifting down, covering the dirty piles in a fresh layer to be dirtied up all over again in the morning. Jason looked at the strings of lights over bodegas and hung up in windows. It was almost Christmas, he realized. He’d forgotten.

The woman was a redhead. He could see now that she’d showered, and now that she was clean it was obvious she was around his age too. She was wearing three layers of clothes and was limp in his arms. She’d spent most of the afternoon trying to fight him, but now she was too tired to put up a fight. She didn’t fight with him as much when it was dark and he was in his suit anyway. She still thought he was Batman.

Tim, barefoot and half naked like usual, was following a safe distance behind as they made their way through winding alleyways to the back door of Dr. Thompkins’s office. That was where people like him and Tim got in.

At last they came around a corner and saw the metal door, and the sign over the bell. RING FOR ASSISTANCE, it said. There was a camera on the wall over the doorway, always recording.

“I don’t see anyone,” Tim whispered.

The alleyway was deserted, except for them.

Jason went over and pushed on the bell with his elbow, since his hands were full. The woman was shivering in his arms, and didn’t complain when she was jostled a little.

They waited a minute, and finally, someone came over and unlatched the door. It was pulled open, light and heat spilling out.

“How may I help you?” the nurse said.

She was youngish, tall and sturdy looking. Her eyes widened a bit when she saw Jason’s mask, and Tim standing behind a safe distance behind him.

“We found this woman,” Jason said. “She needs help.”

He stepped over to the door. The redheaded woman opened her eyes at last and peeked over toward the light. The nurse inspected her face, noticed the scar without flinching, then looked apprehensively up at Jason again. She didn’t back away. He respected that.

“I’ll get a wheelchair. Hold on,” the nurse said.

She shut the door again, leaving Jason and Tim and their homeless woman out in the cold.

“Think she’s going to call the cops?” Jason said, turning to look at Tim.

Tim shrugged.

The nurse was back a couple of minutes later with the wheelchair, though. She held the door open and said, “Bring her in.” She jerked her head at the wheelchair.

Jason stepped inside and set the redhead down in the chair. She seemed to realize what was happening just as soon as he set her down.

“No,” she said. She grabbed the sleeve of his suit, and held on with a death grip.

“It’s ok,” he said, and carefully started pulling her hand away. “Dr. Thompkins will take care of you.”

“Batman,” she said. She started to breathe too fast again, dug her long fingernails in deeper. “Batman!”

In his peripheral vision, Jason saw someone come around the corner of the clinic. When he looked up and down the hall, he saw Dr. Thompkins. She was holding a mug in one hand. She looked older, a little grayer, but just as straight-backed as he remembered. Her eyes widened a little when she saw him, like the nurse. She glanced out the door at Tim, and then she looked down at the redhead.

“Oh,” Dr. Thompkins said. The mug slipped out of her hand and shattered on the tile.

The redhead flinched. Jason used her distraction to his advantage and pulled her hand the rest of the way off. He got up.

“Batman!” the redhead said, reaching for him.

Jason backed away from her and ran out the door. Tim turned and followed him down the alley without hesitation. They were gone in minutes, off to Arkham Island to look for Harley.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce followed Leslie around the bed and looked down at her face.
> 
> There was no denying that it was Carrie. Even older, and with that terrible scar, Leslie would have known that bright red hair and beautiful green eyes anywhere.
> 
> “How?” Bruce said.
> 
> “I don’t know,” Leslie said.

Bruce was down in the cave when Harper got down there to find out about her nightly assignment. He wearing most of the Batman suit except for the cowl, and he was talking to Barbara through the computer.

“There’s no way it would take Selina over an hour to rob them. Their security has always been subpar,” Bruce said.

“ _Then she has to have been taken while she was in the building_ ,” Barbara said.

Harper knew it was wrong to pry, but found herself watching a bit of the grainy video on the monitor. Bruce and Barbara were going over security footage from a bank.

“ _Oh, hello Harper,_ ” Barbara said when she spotted Harper lurking.

“Hey Babs,” Harper said.

Bruce said, “Harper,” by way of greeting, but didn’t turn around.

Harper looked around at the empty cave. Except for her and Bruce, there was no one else. The cave looked ten times bigger when it was so empty.

“What are you working on?” Harper asked. “Anything I can do to help?”

Bruce didn’t answer. He didn’t even look away from the monitor. Harper knew he was preoccupied—by Harley and Catwoman’s disappearances, by Stray’s arrest and Damian’s betrayal, by Stephanie leaving, and then, on top of all of that, the Black Mask problem—but this was taciturn even for him.

“ _Just working on tracking down Catwoman. I think we’ll be able to handle it,_ ” Barbara said, speaking for him.

Harper nodded and was about to say something else, but then Bruce said, “You will be looking for Harley Quinn in Robbinsville tonight.”  

His tone was sharp and Harper flinched. She was glad he didn’t see it.  

“Um, alone?” Harper asked.

Bruce didn’t say anything, and he still didn’t turn around either.

He wasn’t usually like this, at least not with her. He was usually patient with her, and asked her if she understood her orders and reminded her to be safe. Not tonight.

After a moment of prolonged awkward silence, Harper asked, “Where’s Cass? Is she out already?”

Bruce, once again, didn’t respond. He kept rewinding the security footage from the bank so that he could watch the same six seconds over and over. All Harper could see was a dark hallway. There was a potted plant next to a door. She had no clue what Bruce could possibly be looking for during those six seconds, since she couldn’t see anything happening at all.

After a minute it was Barbara who said, “ _Cass went out as a civilian. She should be back soon. Don’t worry about her._ ”

“Oh, I’m not,” Harper said, and thought, _Just nosy_.

Bruce rewound the footage again.

Harper shrugged and turned to go put on her suit, but stopped when she heard a buzzing sound. She looked back to see Bruce reach across the computer’s massive keyboard and pick up his phone. He glanced at the screen before he accepted the call and put it to his ear.

“Leslie? Is something wrong?” he asked, almost sounding like his usual self.

Bruce was quiet then. Harper was too far away to hear what Dr. Thompkins was telling him.

“When?” Bruce said, snapping back into the Batman voice.

He got up and locked down the computer.

“I’ll be there in thirty minutes,” Bruce said, and then hung up without saying goodbye. He turned from the computer and started to head Harper’s direction, but his eyes were focused straight ahead like he didn’t see her.

This time, Harper didn’t bother speaking, no matter how much she wanted to. Bruce walked around her and down the steps to the car, pulling on his cowl as he went. She wasn't surprised when he didn't bother telling her where he was going.

* * *

Batman arrived at Leslie’s clinic in twenty minutes, sliding through the unlocked third story window.

Carrie was laying on her side, facing away from them. Forgoing a greeting, Leslie got up and went around the hospital bed to pull the blanket down.

Bruce followed Leslie around the bed and looked down at her face.

There was no denying that it was Carrie. Even older, and with that terrible scar, Leslie would have known that bright red hair and beautiful green eyes anywhere.

“How?” Bruce said.

“I don’t know,” Leslie said.

“You sedated her.”

“It was necessary,” Leslie told him, wrapping her arms across her chest. “She was distraught.”

“Tell me…” His voice was hoarse. He paused, and when he spoke again, there was no trace of emotion. “Tell me exactly what happened. How did she get here?”

“It was those kids, the ones who Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn picked up a few years back,” Leslie said. “They rang the bell at the back door. Letitia went to answer it and Jack of Clubs was carrying her. He said she needed help, then he helped Letitia get her into a wheelchair and they left.”

“You didn’t stop them?” he said.

Leslie raised an eyebrow and said, “And how exactly am I supposed to stop Jack of Clubs and Nightshade?”

Bruce frowned but didn’t say anything. Sometimes she thought that he forgot how very different he was from everybody else. In more ways than one.

“I didn’t even think of stopping them at the time. All I could think about was Carrie,” she said.

“Did she recognize you?” Bruce asked.

“No. There are signs that her vision is impaired, as well as her speech. I think she mistook Jack of Clubs for you because his suit is so similar to yours,” Leslie said.

And then there was the scar. In her mind, she thought back to the night Bruce brought her Carrie’s body. It had been a long fall, and there was so much blood. She felt sick even now as she recalled Carrie’s ruined face.

Bruce was silent for a long moment as he stared down at Carrie, arms crossed over his massive chest. Leslie, too, felt as if her gaze was being pulled down to her. She kept needing to check to make sure that Carrie was really there, that she was in one piece, that this wasn’t all some kind of hallucination.

“Her appearance now is a concern,” Bruce said.

Leslie’s gaze snapped back up to Bruce.

“What do you mean? It’s Carrie. She’s alive and it is a miracle. I thought you would be—”

Leslie stopped short because she didn’t know how to finish the sentence. Bruce’s thoughts and emotions were too complex for anyone to be able to guess how he would react to anything, but she had definitely been expecting something more positive than suspicion.

“There are things happening in Gotham, Leslie. Things you do not know about,” Bruce said. “The fact that someone resembling Carrie has appeared now is too much of a coincidence for me to ignore. Jack of Clubs and Nightshade being the ones who brought her here is just further evidence of that.”

“Do you even hear yourself? Carrie is _alive_ ,” Leslie said.

“A woman resembling Carrie was found. It may be Carrie, but we cannot know that for sure until Oracle and I have looked into the situation.”

Leslie backed away from him, her arms held out as if to ward him off.

“Unbelievable,” she said. “Every time I start to think you can’t do or say anything else to shock me, you find a way outdo yourself.”

“Leslie,” Bruce said, his voice softer, “I...want it to be her as much as you. But you can’t expect me to accept this without asking some questions first.”

Part of her knew he was right, but the other part of her _knew_ it was Carrie, and hated him for his doubts.

“I will take her with me,” he said.

“I am not going to allow you to chain her up in your cave, Bruce Wayne,” Leslie said, louder than she meant to.

“She will be safer in the cave than she will be here,” Bruce said, eyeing the small exam room and its many faults. Bruce was always trying to talk her into upgrading her security, but she refused to let him meddle too much. He already controlled too much.

“Safer in this case does not necessarily mean that she will be better off,” Leslie said.

“I am sure she will find the familiar surroundings comforting. If she is Carrie.”

Bruce went over to the bed and slid his arms under Carrie. He was able to lift her easily—she was much too thin.

“Bruce, think about what you’re doing,” she said, stepping into his way.

“I am,” he told her. “Alfred is more than capable of helping her, whoever she is. If this is a trap, then it could backfire on your clinic and there are too many innocent people here who need it and you. The best place for her to be is the cave.”

She wanted to argue, even though she knew he was right. Deep down, she just didn’t want Carrie to leave again. She wanted Carrie to stay so that Leslie could watch over her forever.

But Bruce undoubtedly wanted the same thing. This, more than anything, was evidence that he believed it—that deep down, he desperately needed this woman to be Carrie, even as he shielded himself behind his doubts.

“You will take care of her,” Leslie finally said.

“Yes. If...” he said. He trailed off and didn’t finish the sentence.

He stepped around Leslie.

“No harm will come to her. I promise,” he said, not meeting Leslie’s gaze. Then, with Carrie bundled in his arms like a baby, Bruce walked out of the room and took his lost Batgirl home.

* * *

Cassandra took Damian to the apartment building where Stephanie was staying with her friends. She knocked, then studied him as they waited for someone to open the door.

She could tell that Damian was not very happy about being there. His body was telling her that he was feeling a muddled jumble of anxiety, despair, and disgust. He was all tense like a fussy cat walking across a wet lawn, not wanting to let the wetness touch his paws. Except in this case it was dirt and emotions he didn’t want touching him. He kept glaring at the carpet and the water spots on the ceiling like they offended him, but she knew the revulsion was just a distraction from the other things he felt that he didn’t want to feel.

Finally, there was movement in the apartment and someone opened the door.

It was a boy. He was wearing black sweatpants and a holey red shirt, and he had long blond hair. Cassandra did not know who he was. She did not know any of Stephanie’s friends from the time when she had been estranged from Batman, because Stephanie did not talk about them. Cassandra thought maybe there was something not nice about these friends, but they were nice enough to let her stay with them now.

“Can I help you?” the boy said. He loomed out the door, his body already telling her of the hostility he felt looking at them. He studied Damian’s dark wool coat and clean shoes as if they offended him as much as the dirty carpet offended Damian.

“We are here to see Stephanie Brown,” Cassandra said.

“Who?” the boy said.

“Stephanie Brown,” Cassandra said. “I...know she is here. Came in...just now. Watched from down the hall.”

The boy narrowed his eyes at her.

“She doesn’t want to talk to anyone,” he said.

“We are not here to...upset her,” Cassandra said.

“Sorry,” he said, shrugging, and started to shut the door.

Cassandra knew he did not mean the apology. He was happy to turn them away. He was happy to have Stephanie back. Cassandra did not blame him, but she did not like him either.

“Tell her Damian and Cassandra are here,” Cassandra said.

The boy with the blond hair didn’t say anything and shut the door again. Cass heard him turn the deadlock.

She looked down at Damian. Damian glared up at her.

“This is pointless,” he said. “We should have broken in like I suggested.”

“No,” Cassandra said. “Make it worse.”

“And if she doesn’t come out?”

“Then we return tomorrow. Try again,” Cassandra said, and shrugged.

Damian rolled his eyes, but she could see the despair overwhelming the disgust he felt. He was vibrating with it, his whole body a taut string ready to snap.

They waited for ten minutes. Other tenants passed them in the hall, eyeing them with suspicion. Stephanie did not come.

“How long must we wait here?” Damian asked.

Cassandra was about to tell him they could go when suddenly they heard the sound of the deadlock being unbolted and the door was yanked open.

“Are you two really going to stand here all night?” Stephanie asked.

She did not look well. The apartment was dark, and her eyes were shadowed, haunted.

Stephanie’s body told Cassandra the opposite of what Damian’s body was telling her. Damian felt too many emotions—they overwhelmed him. He said and did things he didn’t mean because he didn’t know what to do with them.

Stephanie’s emotions were all numbed. Her body told Cassandra nothing, nothing, nothing. Which was enough to tell Cassandra something.

“No,” Cassandra said. “Just about to leave.”

Stephanie stepped out of the apartment and shut the door behind her so that they had privacy out in the hall. She crossed her arms over her chest.

“You shouldn’t come here,” Stephanie said. She looked over at Damian, but Cassandra did not see that another attempt to attack him was imminent.

“Not even me?” Cassandra asked.

“Any of you. I don’t want you here,” Stephanie said, looking away and down the hall. “I’ve had enough of all of you to last a lifetime.”

This was bad news. Bad news, although Cassandra had been expecting it.

“Damian had...something to say. Then we will go,” Cassandra said.

Stephanie looked down at Damian, her expression blank.

Damian’s expression was haughty and furious, even though he had wanted to come. Cassandra could see everything else he was feeling, but knew Stephanie could not. She would think that Cassandra had dragged him there.

After a moment, Damian still hadn’t moved or said anything. He had his hands in his pockets, and he was standing very straight. When he was still quiet after almost a full minute, Cassandra nudged Damian’s shoulder.

“Do not touch me,” Damian said.

Stephanie sighed and said, “This is a waste of time.”

She turned and put her hand on the doorknob.

“Wait!” Damian said. For just a moment, the haughty expression went away, and anyone who was watching would have been able to see the panic underneath it.

Stephanie turned and stared down at him.

“Cassandra brought me because—”

They had worked on what he should say on the way over. She had impressed upon him, as well as she could, how important it was for him not to give Stephanie the idea that Cassandra was making him apologize. Damian had not understood this very well. The conversation had gone in circles for some time. It was interesting how he knew so many more words than Cassandra, but still did not understand how to speak. He was more like her than unalike.

Damian tried again.

“I have realized that I did not treat you fairly,” he said. “I should not have misled you about why I wanted to be out on patrol. You—”

He paused again, and stared at the wall behind Stephanie instead of looking into her blank gaze. His adam’s apple bobbed up and down as he tried to think of the words.

“You are more skilled than I...I pretended. I also did not listen to you about Dick Grayson. You...were interested in my wellbeing, and I used that against you. I am—I am sorry.”

He closed his mouth and finally looked at Stephanie in the eyes.

Stephanie stared at him. For a long moment, she did not blink.

Cassandra still saw nothing. There was a blankness where Stephanie’s feelings should be. She heard Damian’s words, but they did not have an effect, good or bad.

Eventually, Stephanie looked up at Cass. She pointed at Damian and said, “This is your coaching?”

Cassandra gestured at herself and said, “How could I?”

“You told him what to say,” Stephanie said.

“I brought him here. But he came...wanted to come here. To see you. His...apology is true,” Cassandra said.

Stephanie eyed Cassandra for a moment.

Then she looked back down at Damian and said, “Ok.”

She turned again, twisting the doorknob.

“Don’t come here again,” she said, as she opened the door and went back into her friends’ apartment. Then she shut the door and they heard the deadlock turn for the second time.

It was done.

“Come,” Cassandra said, looking down at Damian and jerking her head toward the stairs.

Damian stared at the door and the doorknob. Then, almost as if in a daze, he turned and followed Cassandra down the hall.

They had made it down three flights of stairs before he spoke.

“I do not understand,” he said.

“What?” Cassandra asked.

“That...Brown,” he said. “She did not look happy.”

Cassandra did not think she had the words to describe the nothingness of Stephanie’s emotions.

“She is not happy,” Cassandra said, shrugging. “Not happy for a long time. She will not be...fixed now from an apology from you.”

“Then what was the point?” Damian asked.

Cassandra turned, and saw that he was angry again. He was also humiliated, and confused, and most of all, exhausted and upset. Apologizing to Stephanie had taken a lot out of him. He was not good with things like this.  

“The apology is not for you,” Cassandra told him. “The apology is for Stephanie. She...decides to accept. Or not. Don’t ever apologize just for you.”

* * *

“Now what do we do?” Jason asked.

Rather than make a deal with one of the rogues on the outside, Tim was letting the green lead them through the tunnels under Arkham. They’d reached the end of one of the tunnels, where the rest of the path was blocked off by a metal gate. A locked metal gate.

“The obvious,” Tim said, shrugging.

Jason was just about to ask what “the obvious” was when vines burst out from the ground and started climbing all over the gate. With a huge crack, they took the door down at the hinges and it fell backwards.

“Wow,” Jason said, waving the dust out of his face. “That was loud.”

“We’re too far down in the basement for anyone to have heard it,” Tim said.

“The basement of an insane asylum,” Jason said. “Great.”

Tim shot him an annoyed look, but went through the door without a word. He’d been in a terrible mood all night, ever since Jason got back to the apartment with his mystery woman and they went to drop her off at Dr. Thompkins’s office. Jason wanted to ask what was wrong, but they had more pressing concerns right now, and Tim had never been very chatty about his feelings.

The double doors beyond the metal gate was padlocked, but Tim took out the padlock with the help of his plants again, and they went in. Then he and Tim stepped into Arkham Asylum.

Just like Tim had said, the layers underneath Arkham Asylum were abandoned. Now they were just a leaky labyrinth of narrow hallways, crumbling plaster and abandoned medical equipment. There were parts where the floor had completely sunken in, and Tim had to have vines create a bridge for them to cross.

“We have to come back this way to get out, don’t we?” Jason asked, eyeing a stain on the wall that looked suspiciously like blood.

“Unfortunately,” Tim said, but kept walking.

At the end of a hall, they reached a metal door. There was a tiny sliver of a window, so Tim peeked through and tried the handle.

“Locked,” he said.

“Move,” Jason said, and knelt down, pulling his lock pick set out of one of his pockets.

Tim went over the plan again while Jason worked on getting the door open.

“Anyone worth talking to is in the secure wing,” Tim said. “The current inmates are Jervis Tetch, Victor Fries, Edward Nygma, Jonathan Crane, and Julian Day. We need to stick together if possible. We’ll go up through the east side of the building and steal a red badge from a staff member on the way up. Then we’ll go to the secure wing and see if anyone is willing to talk to us. Just...follow me.”

“Sounds good,” Jason said, and the lock finally clicked open. Tim looked out the little window again, and nodded to let him know it was all clear. Jason got up and opened the door.

All things considered, it didn’t look as terrible as Jason had imagined it would, especially after walking through the nightmare fuel of the basement. The lights were dim, but that was fine, since it would help them get by the cameras. But the floors and walls were clean, and it wasn’t too cold. He couldn’t hear anybody screaming.

“After you,” Jason whispered, stepping out of the way so Tim could get by.

It was lucky for them that Arkham was chronically understaffed. They hardly came upon any people as they were sneaking their way through the winding hallways.

Tim had explained in the tunnels how only certain badges could access the secure wing. For a while him and Tim went in circles, stalking orderlies and doctors and looking for one of the red ones that could get them in.

Finally, as they came down a hallway, Tim stopped Jason and peeked around a corner.

Then Tim looked up, and Jason heard a familiar crackling sound coming from up above. It took him a minute to put together that Tim had vines following them up on the shadowed ceiling.

A couple of seconds later, Jason heard someone say, “What—?” and then there was a thump around the corner.  

Tim looked again, then straightened and walked around, waving Jason along.

Jason turned the corner and saw the mass of vines that had come down from the ceiling. On one vine there was a dark, beautiful flower, with petals an inky purple color.

A doctor was sprawled out on the ground underneath it.

“Jesus, did you kill him?” Jason asked.

Tim shook his head and said, “He’s unconscious.”

Jason looked at the flower warily as Tim leaned over and pulled the doctor’s badge off his coat, careful so as not to brush the doctor’s skin with his.

“Don’t worry,” Tim said, when he noticed how Jason was eyeing the flower. “It wouldn’t work on you. Come on, this is the right badge.”

Jason pulled the unconscious doctor into a supply closet, and then they headed straight up to the metal doors of the secure wing.

Once there, Tim scanned the badge and the doors beeped, splitting to let them in. Jason and Tim stepped inside, and the doors rumbled shut behind them.

This part of the asylum was worse than Jason had imagined.

He looked down the long hallway at the stained concrete floor. The cells were made of concrete and fronted with glass. On one cell, the glass looked like it had been shattered and somehow melted back together. Overhead, flickering lamps gave the whole unit an eerie greenish glow.

“Jesus,” Jason whispered. He went forward in front of Tim, looking into the first cell. Calendar Man—Julian Day—was inside, but he was sitting in a chair and staring at a wall, acting like Jason wasn’t there.

Tim didn’t follow Jason beyond the entrance.

Jason couldn’t really say he blamed him. All they needed was an orchestra playing in minor key and it would be a set from a horror movie.

“I think he’s ignoring me,” Jason said to Tim. “Hey, you alive in there?”

Julian Day didn’t react.

Tim finally walked over to Jason’s side and looked in at Day, who just continued ignoring them. After a minute, they turned around and looked back into the cell behind them.

...And found that Jervis Tetch was standing by the glass, smiling up at them.

“Tetch,” Tim said.

“Who are you two again?” Tetch asked.

“Nightshade,” Tim said, then pointed at Jason and said, “Jack of Clubs.”

“Ah, yes,” Tetch said, grinning. “Poison Ivy’s pet plant, and Harley Quinn’s mad monster! Welcome to my humble abode.”

He bowed.

“To what do I owe the honor of your visit today?” Tetch asked.

“We’re looking for information about Harley Quinn’s whereabouts,” Tim said.

“The Harlequin is missing?” Tetch asked. He looked curious for a minute, but then his face split into a wide, toothy grin, and he laughed.

Jason glared down at Tetch and said, “Let’s move on. This asshole doesn’t know anything.”

Really he just didn’t want to talk to Tetch. He’d heard some unpleasant rumors about Mad Hatter.

Jason pulled Tim onto the next cell, which housed Victor Fries.

Unfortunately, like Calendar Man, Fries decided to pretend he couldn’t see them. He was sitting on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. After a minute of unsuccessfully trying to get his attention, they moved on to Dr. Crane.

Dr. Crane was sitting on the bare concrete floor, legs crossed. He examined them both for a moment and said, “Timothy Drake. Jason Todd.”

Jason didn’t think it was a good sign that Crane knew their real names.

“Crane,” Tim said.

Crane gave Tim a long look, then pointed one of his bony fingers at Jason.

“I will only speak to you,” he said.

Jason exchanged a glance with Tim, mystified by this, but then he turned back to Crane and asked, “Have you heard about anybody who could be holding a grudge against Harley Quinn?”

“Many people,” Crane intoned in his deep voice. “No one stands out in particular more than the others.”

“So you didn’t hear any rumors about how somebody might try to hurt her?” Jason asked.

Jonathan Crane tipped his head to one side a little and frowned.

 _Finally_ , Jason thought. Maybe this whole episode wasn’t a big waste of time after all.

But Crane just said, “No.”

Tim hissed a little as he released a breath. The sound drew Crane’s attention over to him.

“I’m still working on a formula,” Crane said, almost conversationally, as if he was talking about a cupcake recipe he meant to share with Tim. “A special one, just for you.”

Jason looked at Tim and said, “What’s he talking about?”

“A fear toxin,” Tim said. “None of his usual ones work on me.”

“He tried to use fear toxins on you?” Jason asked, and turned to glower down at Crane. He wondered how strong the glass really was. Somebody had obviously broken it before—Jason thought he might be able to break it again.

“An individual who cannot experience the true depths of fear is not really a person at all. Fear reveals humans for what we really are. A formula that would work even on Timothy and Ivy would be my masterpiece,” Crane said.

Jason pointed down at Crane and told him, “If I see you on the outside, I’m going to put my club through your head. I’ve always kind of wanted to do it anyway.”

Civil conversation was only for villains who didn’t run experiments on his pseudo-brother.

“I look forward to watching you try,” Crane said.

That time it was Tim who turned and went on to the next cell. Jason followed reluctantly. He had a slew of inventive death threats he wouldn’t mind hurling at Crane, but as good as it would feel, Harley’s disappearance was more important. He could always come back to put some real fear in Crane after they found her.

Nygma was the inmate inside the final cell. He too was sitting on the bed, and even though it was fucking freezing inside the secure wing, he had his thin bare feet pressed into the concrete floor.

“Hello Nightshade,” he said, smiling when Tim appeared. He looked over at Jason when Jason came to stand next to Tim, and the smile dimmed a little. His tone was slightly mocking when he added, “Jack of Clubs.”

“Riddler,” Tim said, and Nygma turned all of his attention to him.

Jason knew that Nygma had some thing about how he only liked intellectuals, and for some reason he seemed to believe Jason wasn’t one. Jason didn’t need Nygma’s attention, so he was in no rush to prove otherwise.

“Forgive me for eavesdropping, but I did overhear that you are searching for Harley Quinn,” Nygma said to Tim.

Tim nodded.

“Ah,” Nygma said.

His eyes rolled up to the ceiling. His gaze was glassy, and the skin of his face slack. He was drugged up like the other inmates, possibly more even than the others.

“So it has already begun,” he said, and Jason felt a rush of sick anticipation.

From across the hall, Crane said, “Be quiet, Nygma.”

Riddler didn’t give any indication he’d heard Crane.

“What has begun?” Tim asked.

“The end,” Nygma said, pointing at him. “Your little family has an enemy.”

“Yeah, we figured that part out,” Jason said.

“And not just you, but the Bats too,” Nygma went on, pretending like Jason hadn’t spoken. “Not one of you is safe. Tell me, Timothy. Have you heard from Poison Ivy lately?”

“No,” Tim said.

“You haven’t?” Jason asked Tim, but Tim just frowned down at Nygma and didn’t say anything.

“Hmm,” Riddler said.

“An enemy who hates us and the Bats could be a lot of people. You’re not really giving us any helpful information,” Jason said.

Nygma cocked an eyebrow at him, but turned to look at Tim again. He said, “I have a riddle for you.”

Jason sighed, but Tim asked, “What is it?”

“Tell me, take me, make me. What am I?” Nygma asked.

Tim thought about it for a minute, still frowning.

“You can tell me,” Tim whispered as he thought it over. “You can take me. You can make me.”

Jason had never considered himself to be good at or interested in riddles, but this time the answer struck him like a revelation.

“A joke,” Jason said.

Nygma looked over at Jason, surprised for a moment, but then pleased.

He smiled a slow smile and said, “Precisely. And never a very funny one.”


	14. Chapter Fourteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a while Jason couldn’t take the silence anymore, so he raised his voice a little and asked, “You really haven’t heard from Ivy?”
> 
> Tim kept walking and didn’t say anything. That was enough of an answer for Jason.

Tim was silent as he and Jason trekked across the barren expanse of Arkham Island back to their stolen boat.

On the surface, Jason was calm. Any other shitshow of a situation, he would be yelling or destroying something by now. But this time he felt like his internal panic was making his muscles shut down, making him lethargic and useless. Tim didn’t seem to have anything to say either.

After a while Jason couldn’t take the silence anymore, so he raised his voice a little and asked, “You really haven’t heard from Ivy?”

Tim kept walking and didn’t say anything. That was enough of an answer for Jason.

“Why didn’t you say anything, man?” Jason asked.

For a beat, Tim didn’t respond. Then he finally said, “We were looking for Harley. I was going to go look for Ivy after we were done here."

“You should’ve told me you hadn’t heard from her. I know you two have some kind of special plant people bond, but she’s Harley’s wife and I’ve known her for longer than you. If she’s in danger, you tell me,” Jason said.

“I was hoping I was just worrying for nothing. Ivy’s tough. She can take care of herself,” Tim said.

“And Harley can’t?” Jason asked.

Jason heard Tim sigh.

“That wasn’t what I meant,” Tim said.

They walked on for a bit longer in silence. The trek hadn’t seemed that long when they were on their way to the asylum, but now it seemed like it would never end. Jason stepped around something he thought was a tree branch, but when shined the flashlight on it, he discovered it was the bent wheel of an old rusted bicycle. The tire was gone, all fallen away, and it was way too small to be an adult’s bike. Jason felt goosebumps prickle on his arms. All of Arkham—not just the asylum part—really was a hellscape. He wanted nothing more than to be back on the mainland.

They walked into a clearing, and Jason heard Tim say, “I don’t think it’s a good idea to jump to any conclusions.”

Jason didn’t say anything, but reached forward and grabbed Tim’s arm, pulling him around so he had to stop and look Jason in the eyes. Tim yanked his arm out of Jason’s grasp, but didn’t resume walking.

“What?” Tim snapped.

“Which part of this seems like a wild conclusion to you?” Jason asked.

Tim put his hands on his bare hips and huffed out a breath. He wasn’t really looking Jason in the eye, which was a pretty good giveaway of his level of unease.

“Well, I’m just saying,” Tim told him. “Nygma was obviously drugged out of his mind. And who says we can trust him anyway? He could’ve just been saying all of that to mess with us. Everybody else in the secure wing was.”

“So, then where is Ivy?” Jason asked. “Where’s Harley? Who sent that postcard with the Jester makeup drawn all over it to our old house? Where’s Selina, come to think of it? Who would go to all the trouble to destroy Amusement Mile?”

Tim rolled his eyes, but Jason could see the way that Tim’s mouth was pulling down at the corners. He believed it—he just didn’t want to believe it.

“It makes sense that it’s him,” Jason said.

“You know there are plenty of freaks out there who think he was awesome and, like, deified him after he died. It could be a copycat. Riddler didn’t say it was actually him,” Tim said.

This was true. As soon as Nygma told them his stupid little riddle, he clammed up and wouldn’t tell them anything else.

But Jason knew he was right. As much as he hated to even think it, Joker was back.

“No random Joker fanboy jackass has the brains or the resources to take on all three Sirens. Even Batman can hardly handle all of them together.”

“Joker is _dead_. Rook killed him. It was caught on video,” Tim said.

“His body was never found!” Jason said. The words exploded out of him, and as soon as he said it, he realized suddenly that it was something that had always bothered him. He just hadn’t figured it out until now.

“His body was never found because Rook pushed his body into the harbor,” Tim said.

Jason let out a snarl of frustration and stomped away from Tim, aiming a kick a fallen tree branch. He rubbed his hands over his face and made himself breathe.

He had to calm down. He wasn’t mad at Tim, not really, and trying to fight with Tim was pointless anyway.

When he felt a little calmer, he turned back around and said, “Look, Tim. I get what you’re saying, but you didn’t ever have to deal with Joker. He was already gone by the time you were turned into Nightshade, so you don’t understand how he operates the way I do. This situation has him written all over it.”

Tim opened his mouth to retort, but Jason pointed at him and said, “No, reading articles about him and eavesdropping on Harley and Ivy’s conversations doesn’t count. I don’t care how much you think you know about Joker, nothing prepares you for the real deal.”

Tim didn’t say anything, and Jason turned and kept walking. Tim lingered in the clearing for a moment longer before he finally followed Jason.

A few silent minutes later, they walked through the trees and there was the shore and, thank god, the boat. Across the river, the shining lights of Gotham wavered in the cold night air like a mirage.

Instead of going to the boat, Jason turned around and faced Tim again. He didn’t say anything.

“So...if it is him, then what do we do?” Tim asked.

In the dim light, Tim looked thin and young in a way that Jason didn’t usually notice. It made Jason uneasy, looking at him. Nobody could touch his skin, but that had never meant that Tim was invulnerable. And now there was nobody around to watch his back except for Jason.

Jason wished he could talk to Harley and Ivy. Hell, even having Dick or Selina there would’ve made him feel better. He hadn’t realized how much he counted on them having them in his corner until they were gone.

“I have no idea what we’re going to do, Tim. No fucking idea,” Jason said. He turned away and went to the boat.

* * *

Harper finally gave up and headed back to her bike around 4 a.m. She was frozen solid even with her winter suit’s extra insulation, and nobody she’d talked to all night had seen or heard from the notorious Harley Quinn.

Bruce’s mysterious departure had been lurking at the back of her mind all night. As she made her way home, she found herself accelerating a little faster and taking a few maybe risky turns that Bruce and Babs would ordinarily chide her about. They’d both been totally silent over the comms all night, though, so Harper didn’t think anybody was watching her.

It was only when she arrived at the cave that she realized she’d been expecting it to be empty.

It definitely wasn’t empty. She looked up the steps and saw that almost everybody was gathered around the med bay: Bruce, Cass, Damian, Alfred, even Barbara. There was someone up on the bed.

Curious, Harper got off her bike and headed up, pulling off her helmet and tucking it under her arms as she went.

As Harper came up and approached the medbay, she saw a flash of red. Then Alfred stepped out of the way, and Harper made eye contact with a woman.

She had short red hair and pale green eyes. There was a large scar on her face that covered her cheek and spilled down her neck. Babs was next to the hospital bed, looking so much like her that they could’ve been sisters. She and the woman were holding hands.

It took Harper a moment to accept that this wasn’t a hallucination.

It was Carrie Kelley, the second Batgirl. She looked very different from the old photographs of her. She smiled a lot, in the old pictures. Now she was older, too thin, and horrifically scarred, but it was undeniably her.

Alive.

Harper heard Alfred say, “There you are, Miss Harper.”

Harper didn’t say anything or even look his way. She couldn’t take her eyes off Carrie. Carrie, it seemed, couldn’t take her eyes off Harper either.

“Harper, this is Carrie,” Babs said.

“Oh my god,” Harper said.

Carrie’s hand tightened around Barbara’s when Harper spoke.

“We believe this is Carrie,” Bruce said.

“The fingerprints match,” Barbara said.

Carrie finally looked away from Harper and started to glance between Bruce and Barbara.

“The DNA test will not be complete for several hours,” Bruce said.

“You’d have to be an idiot to not know it’s her. Cass never even met her and she knew right away,” Barbara said.

_I knew right away_ , Harper thought, but since it was generally not a good idea to get in the middle of things when Barbara and Bruce were arguing, she kept her mouth shut.

“We are ruling out all possibilities before we make any claims regarding her identity,” Bruce said.

“Jesus, Bruce,” Barbara said, shaking her head.

Bruce kept right on talking.

“I thought I trained you better than to draw conclusions before you have all of the facts,” he said.

“You have always taken way too much credit for my training, and you know it’s not your thoroughness that I am taking issue with,” Barbara said.

On the bed, Carrie was definitely starting to breathe a little bit faster than before. She clenched her eyes shut, and Harper pointed at her.

“Um,” Harper said, still pointing.

Barbara finally noticed and tucked a stray strand of hair out of Carrie’s face.

“It’s ok, Carrie,” Babs said. “It’s ok.”

“I need all of you except Alfred and Barbara to give us some space. She doesn’t—” Bruce stopped short for a second, and apparently thought better of whatever it was he was going to say. Instead he snapped, “You’re frightening her.”

Harper put her hands up, then backed up and went around a medical stand out of the medical bay.

She didn’t know what else to do, and everything was way too interesting to just go shower and head up to bed, so she went to join Cass and Damian.

They were standing over closer to the equipment lockers. Cass was wearing her Black Bat suit, and Damian was wearing jeans and a grey sweater. They didn’t acknowledge her went she came over to stand with them.

For a while, Cass, Damian, and Harper didn’t speak. There was a lot going on over on the medbay. Barbara and Bruce hadn’t given up on their argument, but they were being a lot quieter about it now. Alfred was asking Carrie a bunch of questions, but didn’t get a whole lot of responses.

When Harper couldn’t reign in her curiosity anymore, she leaned over to Cass and whispered, “What’s the matter with her? Why isn’t she responding?”

Cass tapped her own forehead with her pointer finger and said, “Damage.”

“Ah,” Harper said. That made sense. Though it had not been that long of a fall, Carrie had hit her head when Joker cut her grappling line. It had been the part of the fall that killed her.

“How is she alive?” Harper asked.

Cass twitched a shoulder, but it was Damian who spoke.

“Father did not take the time to explain,” he said.

Harper looked down at him, a little surprised. Damian didn’t usually talk around her.

“Before I left for patrol, he got a call from Dr. Thompkins and he rushed off right away,” Harper told them. “She must’ve been the one who found Carrie.”

Damian and Cass glanced up at Harper, but they didn't have anything to say about this. They both turned back to watch the others.

Damian was scowling. Harper studied him for a minute and thought there was something a little bit more blunted about the expression than usual. He didn’t appear to be all that interested in Carrie, though. He just kept staring at his father.

“Someone will need to tell Stephanie,” Cass said.

“They haven’t already?” Harper asked.

“They didn’t tell me,” Cass said. “I...arrived and found out. Did they tell you?”

“No,” Harper said. “The comms were quiet all night.”

“Then...someone needs to tell her,” Cass said.

“She left the team,” Damian said harshly.

“She is still one of us. A Bat. Always one of us,” Cass said, then glanced down at him and said, “Like you.”

Damian just frowned and glared over at his father.

“Not it,” Harper said, hoping to diffuse some of the tension.

Cass and Damian looked over at her and stared blankly.

“You know,” Harper said, making a helpless gesture, and then remembered she was talking to two kids who’d been raised by assassins. “It’s, uh, a thing that you say when you don’t want to do something. Everybody says not it, and then the person who says it last has to do the thing.”

Damian cocked a suspicious eyebrow at Harper, but didn’t comment. Cass just looked thoughtful.

“I’ll do it,” Cass said. “Talk to Stephanie.”

Harper didn’t say anything, but silently wished Cullen was there. Someone would need to tell him about Carrie too, she realized. She wondered if he was awake.

“I should take Titus for his walk,” Damian said.

Then, without waiting for either of them to say anything, Damian turned away and walked up the path to the elevator. Bruce and Alfred were too busy to notice him going and Cass didn’t stop him.

When he walked into the elevator and the doors slid shut, Harper pointed after him and said, “Shouldn’t one of us go with him? The last time he was unsupervised he ran off and got Stray arrested.”

Cass shook her head and said, “He’s not lying. Really...going to take Titus for a walk.”

“How are you so sure?” Harper asked.

Cass’s eyes narrowed slightly, although she didn’t look away from the medbay. Harper thought she might be annoyed, although with Cass it was hard to tell.

“He doesn’t want to sneak away,” Cass said, and left it at that.   

* * *

Dick’s very first thought upon waking up that morning was that he did not like prison.

He knew it was stupid to complain about prison. Everybody hated it, it was awful; that’s why people were talking about prison all the time on the news and writing books about it. He’d always understood, in a removed sense, that being sent to prison would be very bad. Selina had been in prison before. She told him stories. Yet somehow the reality of the situation managed to eclipse every anxious thought he’d ever had about it.

Dick didn’t have a choice in the matter, so he climbed out of bed.

So far, every morning had the same routine.

Dick scratched at the skin under the chafing mechanical cuff around his wrist as he dressed. His day clothes were a white shirt and a tan jumpsuit. Calling them “pre-used” was an understatement.

Dick’s cellmate, a chunky white guy named William, dressed in silence on the other side of their cell. William didn’t have to wear a mechanical cuff around his wrist. That was one of the first and only things Dick had noticed about him.

Once dressed, Dick allowed himself to be handcuffed by the guard who was standing outside his cell.

“Having a good morning?” Dick asked him.

The guard did not respond. His tag said his name was Officer Lorence. He was broad, had orangey hair and a mustache, and he was a lot taller than Dick. He didn’t talk to Dick unless it was absolutely necessary.

“I’m starving,” Dick said. “The food in here is terrible. The warden knows that, right?”

Officer Lorence just snapped the metal ring around his other wrist and tightened it.  

After a brief visit to the bathroom, Lorence followed Dick to the prison cafeteria. Dick made his way through the line while Officer Lorence stood a short distance away. There were no incidents while Dick got his breakfast, and then he found a solitary spot at the end of one of the tables. Office Lorence hovered in the corner of his eye as he picked at his inedible portion of watery scrambled eggs.

The other inmates and guards stared at Dick curiously while he ate, but no one approached.

When they put the mechanical cuff on him, it had been explained to him, like he was an idiot, that he was awaiting trial at Blackgate because he was an escape risk. Officer Lorence followed Dick everywhere and was with him except for at night, when a different officer took over watching Dick as he slept.

Lorence also carried some kind of stun gun. For obvious reasons, the other inmates tended to keep their distance. In a lot of ways this was a good thing, but in some other ways it was inconvenient. He knew there were men in Blackgate who had ties to the Sirens, but no one would get near enough for him to be able to ask if they’d heard anything from Selina.  

With that discomforting thought, Dick gave up on the eggs and picked up his apple. It was small and already a little mushy, but Dick bit into it anyway. He was unsurprised to find that it was mealy and tasteless.

Dick looked over at Officer Lorence and studied the stun gun.

His mouth was full of mealy apple when he asked, “I’ve been wondering. Is that to use on me or to protect me?”

Officer Lorence didn’t say anything.

“A bit of both,” Dick said. “That’s what I guessed.”

He took another bite out of his apple and was distressed to find it almost gone. He was considering eating the core too when there was an unpleasant slurping sound behind him.

Dick turned around to find...clay. He craned his head and looked up at Clayface’s gnarled visage.

“Oh, hey Basil,” Dick said.

“Grayson,” Basil said.

“Keep your distance, Karlo,” Officer Lorence said.

Dick turned to the guard and asked, “Am I not allowed to talk to other prisoners?”

Officer Lorence narrowed his eyes at Dick, then gave Basil the same suspicious examination before he said, “Basil Karlo is dangerous.”

“Basil’s not a threat to me,” Dick said. “He’s a friend.”

A few years ago, Dick and Basil had robbed a factory together. Basil wasn’t the most discreet guy, but he got the job done.

“A friend,” Karlo agreed, and gave Lorence a crooked grin. It was nice to know that not everyone in Blackgate was wary of his guard.

Basil sat down then, and Officer Lorence didn’t complain about it or try to stop him. Basil was giant, so he had to leave one seat empty between them.

“I didn’t know you were in here,” Dick told him.

Basil grinned again and said, “I was in solitary. Just got out yesterday.”

“Really? What did they put you in solitary for?” Dick asked.

“I tried to drown someone in clay,” Basil said.

Dick figured he should’ve guessed.

Dick bit off the lower half of his apple core. The crunchiness of the seeds was unpleasant, but he was starting to get hungry enough that it didn’t matter.

“How long have you been in here?” Dick asked Basil.

“Three months,” he said.

_Three months_ , Dick thought, and suppressed a shudder. He was already going crazy, and it had only been days.

Dick was about to ask something else when Basil leaned sideways and tipped over onto him. Dick reacted in just enough time to hold his breath, then he was being swallowed up by Clayface goo.

It couldn’t have lasted more than a few seconds, but by the time Dick was free again and coughing up clay and apple core on the tile floor, guards were swarming Basil and threatening him with some kind of freeze gas.

“Are you hurt?” Office Lorence snapped.

“Fine,” Dick said, spitting on the ground. He wiped the back of his hand across his tongue. Basil was surprisingly grainy.

Officer Lorence snorted.

“Not a threat to you my ass,” he muttered.

Dick ignored Lorence and looked up at Clayface.

“What the hell, Basil?” he asked.

“Patience,” Basil said.

“Back to solitary, freak!” one of the guards yelled at Basil.

Dick watched as Basil was herded away by the other guards.

"On your feed, Grayson," Officer Lorence said. He grabbed Dick by the arm and yanked him to his feet. 

Dick realized as he was being pulled up that something was different.

There was something tucked into his pocket that hadn’t been there before.

* * *

Damian took Titus and his sketchbook out to one of his favorite sections of the grounds. The morning air was sharp, but Titus didn’t seem to mind it or the snow. Damian found a boulder on a slope that overlooked the horizon and some winter-bare trees, and let Titus off his leash.

He tossed a stick for Titus to go fetch, then brushed the snow off the boulder. He tucked his feet under his knees as he sat down on top of it. Then he flipped to a blank page in his sketchbook and began to sketch his surroundings.

Damian hardly noticed the frigid air or the weak winter sunlight as he worked. Titus chased birds and dove into snow banks while Damian marked out the faint line of the horizon and the distant shadow of Gotham City in his sketchbook. He started to draw the trees.

The soft scratching sound of his pencil on the paper lured him into the snare of his thoughts, where everything was as tangled as the branches he was sketching.

Everything had gone wrong. Damian has caught Stray, but was the villain of the story rather than the hero. He did not know how to fix his mistake, and Father and Brown hated him. Brown did not believe he was sorry, and Cassandra said there was nothing else he could do to convince her of his sincerity.

A robin landed on the snow below Damian’s boulder. It began to dig in the snow with its beak. Damian moved his pencil to a blank section of the page and quickly drew its shape, adding more details when it did not fly away.

As he drew the bird, his mind drifted again, this time it was to the woman down in the cave.

Damian understood, with a terrible, bracing clarity, that now there was no hope that he would ever be accepted by his father. Carrie Kelley was alive. She had been his father’s favored partner and his greatest tragedy. Now she that she was returned to him, Damian would forever be just a disappointment—failed, ruined experiment in rehabilitation, to be set aside forever and forgotten.

Part of him wished that the situation would just go away. He knew Brown and Cassandra would be upset with him if they knew he was thinking such things, but It wasn’t as if he wished Kelley was still dead.

_What is it that you want?_ Damian wondered, frustrated with himself. He tried to capture the intelligent tilt of the bird’s head as he thought over the question, but he came up with no answer.

The robin was joined by another. They chirped at each other and hopped around in the thick snow.

Without really thinking about it, Damian moved on to a new page in his sketchbook.

He started drawing his father’s cowl first, then the cape. He had seen his father’s suit enough times that it was easy to draw it without having to see his father before him. He wasn’t supposed to draw such things, but he was already a disappointment to his father, so he had no inclination to stop.

When the drawing of his father was done, Damian started to draw Batgirl next. He drew Row’s helmet, then her odd armored gauntlets and breastplate. The symbol that Batgirl wore was distinct from his father’s symbol. It was recognized and respected in a way that Damian’s Rook symbol was not.

Cassandra was next, and more birds joined the two robins while he drew her. He drew Cassandra in her Black Bat suit, which was so similar to his father’s. Eyes that saw too much were hidden behind the domino mask, but he could feel them on him, even just drawn on the page. Gordon, too, saw everything. He drew Gordon the way she had looked that morning, fiercely arguing with his father about Kelley.

He had to turn to a new page so he had enough room to draw Carrie Kelley’s suit in its display case. He drew Kelley’s face as well, even though he was not as familiar with it, and what he recalled of the scar that spread down her cheek.

He was just finishing up the image of Kelley’s face when Titus barreled up the hill, scattering all the birds. He dropped another stick on Damian’s sketchbook, and Damian picked it up and tossed it for him again. Titus immediately bounded off to go get it, disappearing behind some bushes with a happy bark.

When he was gone, Damian began a sketch of Spoiler. He drew her sitting on a gargoyle, keeping a close watch over the Diamond District.

He remembered how it had been when he first went out to patrol with Brown, how he had been so irritated with her because she didn’t seem to want do anything. Then he thought about what Cassandra said the previous evening about how Brown wasn’t happy, and how her unhappiness couldn’t be fixed just because Damian apologized. He hadn’t understood that at the time, but as he drew Brown’s eyes, blank and weary over the mask that covered the lower half of her face, he thought maybe he was starting to.

He was just completing the image when he realized he didn’t hear Titus anymore.

Damian stopped his pencil and looked up. He didn’t see Titus either.

“Titus?” Damian said.

Titus didn’t come when he called. There was no sound, only the hush of the winter landscape. Even the birds were no longer chirping.

He was just setting his pencil down when there was a soft thrum in the air and something struck him in the neck.

At once, Damian grabbed it and examined it in his hand. It was a black dart.

It and his sketchbook fell out of his fingers. Darkness was already spinning in his head as he tipped off the boulder into the snow.


	15. Chapter Fifteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Out of the corner of her eye, Cassandra saw Bruce lift his head slightly and look around the cave.
> 
> “Alfred, where is Damian?” he asked.

It was late afternoon when Cassandra woke from her nap and headed back to the batcave. Bruce had not moved.

Cassandra did not know what to think about Carrie Kelley. She did believe it was really her, and could tell that Bruce believed it too, no matter what he said to the contrary. She was glad Carrie was alive, but was nervous about how Stephanie would take the news. Stephanie had always worried about how she compared to Carrie in Bruce’s eyes.

“Cassandra, can you look over the footage from the cameras behind Leslie’s clinic?” Bruce asked her.

He wasn’t really doing anything now. He had his arms crossed over his chest and was watching Alfred, who was trying to coax Carrie into having some orange juice. Alfred said Carrie used to like juices of all flavors once, but now she didn’t anymore. She kept pushing the hand with the juice glass away.

“We need to figure out how Jason Todd and Timothy Drake were the ones who had her,” Bruce continued, but he sounded distracted, like he didn’t notice he was saying it.

“I know,” Cassandra said.

“You must drink something, Miss Carrie,” Alfred said, lowering the juice glass toward her face. “You need the nutrients and the calories.”

Carrie sniffed at the juice and made a face.

Out of the corner of her eye, Cassandra saw Bruce lift his head slightly and look around the cave.

“Alfred, where is Damian?” he asked.

Alfred gave up on getting Carrie to take the juice and straightened, frowning as he looked over at Bruce.

“I’m afraid I’m not sure,” he said. “My apologies, Master Bruce. I was so distracted by Carrie’s care that I didn’t notice him slipping away.”

“I saw him...earlier. Took Titus out for a walk,” Cassandra said.

She thought about how long ago had that had been—at least a couple of hours. Before her nap. She hadn’t seen Damian since, and that was unusual. Even when he was grounded from patrol he tended to sneak around in the cave. He thought no one noticed, but Cassandra did.

Bruce sighed softly and walked over to the computer. He pushed the button for the intercom in Damian’s room and said, “Damian, are you in your room?”

He released the button and they waited. Even Carrie was looking over at Bruce curiously.

But there was no response. Only silence.

Bruce picked up his phone and tapped at the screen, then put it to his ear. They waited again, but after a while, Bruce lowered the phone and said, “He didn’t answer.”

Something felt...off. Cassandra could feel instinctual dread curling up her spine. Maybe Bruce felt it too, because Bruce turned and walked up to the elevator without a word.

“Go with him,” Alfred told Cassandra, nodding after Bruce. “I’ll stay with Carrie.”

Carrie knew Alfred and did not know Cassandra, so Cassandra did as Alfred said and followed Bruce to the elevator.

Once inside, Bruce asked, “You believed him when he said he was going to take Titus out for a walk?”

“Yes,” Cassandra said.

Bruce crossed his arms over his chest again but didn’t say anything else on the way up.

As soon as they emerged from the cave’s entrance behind the clock, Bruce went to the hall and called, “Damian?”

There was no answer, but it was a large house. Cassandra followed Bruce out of the room and down the hall toward the stairs.

“Check his room,” he said.

Cassandra nodded and departed for Damian’s room at once.

She didn’t run into anyone else in the hallways on the way there. She arrived at his room barely a minute after leaving Bruce, but when she knocked on the door, no one answered. Cassandra opened the door and switched on the light.

Damian’s room was spare and tidy. Except for some weapons on the walls, it looked more like a guest room than a young boy’s bedroom. A young boy who enjoyed exotic, sharp weapons hanging on their wall was possibly not normal. She wouldn’t know.

It was also empty. Even his little cat wasn’t there.

Cassandra shut the door again and went back downstairs.

She found Bruce in the kitchen. He was in the middle of interrogating Harper and Cullen.

“I haven’t seen him,” Harper said, shrugging. “The last time I saw him he was down in the cave and said he was going to take Titus out.” Harper made eye contact with Cassandra, but didn’t say what she was obviously thinking.

Bruce looked at Cullen next, and he shrank a little under Bruce’s stern gaze.

“I haven’t seen him either,” Cullen said. “Not for hours.”

Cass frowned. She still didn’t think Damian had wanted to run away. He’d been miserable the last time she saw him, but there was no fight in him, no burning desire to prove himself anymore. He had no reason to run.

“Harper, could you go look for him in the library for me please?” Bruce asked. “If you don’t find him there, check the music room too.”

Harper nodded and got up at once to go look. As she went past, Bruce pulled out his phone to make another call.

Cassandra and Cullen watched him tap the screen and put the phone to his ear. As he headed to the back door, he said, “We can’t find Damian. Cassandra says he told her he was going to take Titus for a walk. Can you get a lock on him and send it to me?”

He went outside without stopping for a coat. Cassandra followed him, leaving Cullen in the kitchen alone, watching them go.

“Thank you, Barbara,” Bruce said, striding forward across the garden. It was dark outside again, overcast. It had resumed snowing. “I’ll keep you on the line, if you don’t mind.”

Then Bruce took the phone away from his ear and yelled, “Damian!”

When there was no response, Cassandra also cupped her hands over her mouth. She yelled, “Titus!”

Bruce put his fingers in his mouth and whistled. Then they waited, listening.

Nothing.

Bruce turned to Cassandra and said, “Barbara found him. South end.”

“Still here? On the...property?” Cassandra asked.

“Yes, he’s still here,” Bruce said, and jerked his head. “Come on.”

They headed toward the south side of the grounds, and Cassandra finally spotted his footprints on the way down, almost invisible under a fresh layer of snow.

“There,” she said, pointing. The boot prints were small enough to be Damian’s, and there were dog tracks as well. Both sets of footprints led around a thick copse of trees and bushes. Bruce changed direction and went where she was pointing, and she followed him.

But as they came around the copse to a slope, Cassandra could hear something that sounded like whining. Bruce heard it too and sped up. She peeked around him and saw Titus, muzzled with some kind of white fabric and tied to a tree with his leash.

Cassandra went to the dog at once. He whined and nosed at her face, and when she saw he was shivering, she hugged him.

“Cassandra,” Bruce said sharply. She turned her head and looked back over to him.

There was blood on the snow. It was almost hidden in the shadow of the boulder, so she hadn’t noticed at first. Bruce bent and picked up something that was tiny and black.

“Damian’s tracker. It was removed from his arm,” Bruce said.

There was something else too, almost buried under the snow. Cassandra pointed at it and Bruce walked over to grab it. It was a book.

“This is his sketchbook,” he said as he flipped through the pages. He looked over at Titus and Cassandra. He was still on the phone with Barbara and he said, “He’s not here. His tracker was removed from his arm. He could’ve done that himself, but Damian would never leave Titus—”

Bruce noticed the other boot prints at the same time as Cassandra and stopped talking. They headed southeast.

“Damian,” she said, but the boot prints were different, larger. And there were more of them. Someone else had been here—not just Damian and Titus, but other people, at least two.

Bruce walked over to the boot prints, the sketchbook still held in his other hand.

“He’s not here,” Bruce said. “Barbara…he’s not here. There are boot prints, but they're not his. I think Damian has been abducted.”

He lifted up the sketchbook and stared at the pages, warped now from having been left in the snow.

* * *

Tim didn’t like being separated from the green. He didn’t think it was a good idea for Jason to go look for Black Mask either, but apparently they had reached a point where what Tim thought wasn’t important.

He understood Jason’s point. If the Joker was back, then they were in danger, and they needed help. But he didn’t think they needed Black Mask’s kind of help, and he didn’t appreciate being told to hide out in Jason’s secret apartment in the meantime. It had been hours since Jason left. It was early afternoon now, and while Jason texted occasionally to reassure him that he was still out there and not kidnapped, Tim still didn’t like it. He had never felt more antsy in his life.

So he wasn’t doing much—just bouncing his leg up and down and picking at a loose string coming off one of Jason’s blankets—when he heard a soft whoosh of air outside the apartment window. He’d heard that sound before, so he got up and went over to open the window.

His traitorous heart skipped a beat when he looked out and saw Superboy floating by the fire escape.

“You again,” Tim said.

“Nightshade,” Superboy said.

“This is a bad time,” Tim told him.

“I’m not here to fight you.”

Tim glared at him, but somehow he believed Superboy. So he just shrugged and said, “You might as well come in,” and turned and headed back into the den.

He sat back down on the futon and watched Superboy float inside. The window wasn’t wide, and Superboy had to angle himself diagonally to fit. When he was inside the apartment, he looked curiously around, still hovering above the floor.

“What is this place?” Superboy asked.

“A safe house,” Tim said. “A compromised one now, thanks to you.”

Superboy raised an eyebrow and floated closer to him, still careful to stay out of Tim’s reach. He didn’t apologize for being a stalker. Tim wasn’t really surprised.

“What do you want?” Tim asked him.

Superboy frowned and crossed his arms over his chest, shooting Tim a disapproving frown that was already familiar. Tim thought, _Here it comes._ He wasn’t in the mood for another lecture.

“I think you should join Young Justice,” Superboy said.  

Tim thought he had been prepared to mock anything that could come out of Superboy’s mouth, but he wasn’t prepared for that. For a moment, all Tim could do was stare at him, his mouth agape.

He finally managed, “What?”

“I think you should join Young Justice,” Superboy said again.

For the second time that afternoon, Tim’s heart skipped a beat. He ignored it.

“Are you insane?” Tim asked.

“No, I’m not,” Superboy said.

“Are you forgetting that I’m a criminal? Like, an actual criminal who has a record?”

“Look,” Superboy said, and suddenly seemed to not be able to look him in the eye, “everything you said the first time we met about how you’re not a monster—I think you weren’t lying about all of that. From what I can tell, you genuinely seem to be trying, in your own occasionally misguided way, to make the world a better place.”

“And you would know this how?” Tim asked.

“Because I read about you,” Superboy said.

Tim wondered if he was imagining that Superboy’s cheeks suddenly looked a little redder than before.

Superboy blustered on.

“It’s not like you asked to be turned into Nightshade. Your methods have never been as extreme as Poison Ivy’s have been in the past. You warn people not to get too close and you go out of your way not to hurt anyone. You just want the bad guys exposed for being the bad guys that they are.”

Superboy paused there, but Tim didn’t join the conversation, so Superboy went on.  

“Young Justice needs people who are powerful and willing to put themselves into the line of fire for the greater good,” Superboy said. “You’re already doing that. Think about how much more you could achieve if you had a team. We also have resources. Maybe we could help you with the skin thing or something. I don’t know.”

At this last part, he finally looked into Tim’s eyes. His own expression was pleading, almost desperate, and for the life of him Tim couldn’t figure why.

“I have a team,” Tim said.

“No, you have a mentor. That’s not the same thing. Believe me, I know,” Superboy said, forcing a smile, though this one looked a little more bitter than what Tim would have expected from a Super.

For a moment, the apartment was absolutely silent.

Then Tim said, “No.”

Superboy’s arms tightened around his chest.

“Why not?” he asked.

“I don’t care how many articles you read about me,” Tim said. “You got me all wrong. I’m not a good person.”

“That isn’t true,” Superboy said, glaring, and Tim thought he seemed weirdly mad about it. “Just because because you’re not always nice doesn’t mean you aren’t being a good person.”

Tim looked away from him and said, “You should go.”

“Timothy—”

“We’re not friends,” Tim snapped. “Don’t call me that.”

“I don’t understand why you’re so afraid—”

Superboy’s sentence was interrupted by the sound of footsteps in the hallway outside of the apartment. Superboy and Tim looked over as whoever it was came up to the door and unlocked it with the key.

Jason walked in and immediately zeroed in on Superboy.

“What the fuck?” he said.

Jason looked at Tim, then back at Superboy again. His eyes traveled down to the gap of air between Superboy’s feet and the floor.

“Am I...interrupting something?” Jason asked.

“He was just leaving,” Tim said.

Superboy scowled at Jason, then over at Tim.

“Think about what I said,” Superboy said, and floated backwards toward the window.

“I won’t,” Tim said, not bothering to look at him.

“If you change your mind, you know how to reach me,” he said.

Tim almost said, “I do?” but didn’t, and then Superboy flew back out the way he came in. Tim heard another whoosh of air as he flew up above the building. Just like the last time, there was a distant crack that had to mean Superboy had left Gotham.

“Jesus,” Jason said. He came in and shut the door. “What was he doing here?”

“He asked me to join Young Justice,” Tim said.

Jason snorted and said, “No shit. You?”

Tim felt a stab of something like pain at the disbelief in Jason’s voice, but still heard himself saying, “Yeah, I know.”

“That must be some crush.”

Tim blushed.

“Did you find Black Mask?” Tim asked.

Jason grunted and muttered a few select swears under his breath.

“No, the fucker’s playing hard to get now. I couldn’t find him or one of his men anywhere, and everybody who I thought might have a connection to him told me to fuck off,” Jason said.

Tim felt some of the tension leave him. They needed help, but Tim still didn’t think they needed _Black Mask’s_ help.

“So what now?” Tim asked.

“For starters?” Jason asked, looking back at the open window. “Getting a new safe house. Then we should probably look into the situation with old Dickhead, right?”

“You think we can get Dick out of Blackgate?” Tim asked.

Jason snorted again and said, “Hell no. But we’re going to need all the allies we can get if we’re going up against the Joker, right?”

“We’ll probably get ourselves caught,” Tim said.

“Yeah, well at least Joker would have to go through all the guards at Blackgate to get to us, then,” Jason said.

Tim stared at the carpet and said, “I had a thought.”

“Which is?”

“What about Batman?” Tim asked.

“What about him?”

“Well,” Tim said, “he could help us. Right?”

Jason didn’t say anything, and Tim was finally curious enough that he looked up to peek at Jason’s expression.

Jason was staring at him, and he wasn’t blinking.

“You’re not serious,” Jason said.

Tim didn’t say anything.

“Sheesh, Tim,” Jason said, and came into the den to sit in the sagging camp chair across from the futon. “I knew you were kind of obsessed with the guy, but I didn’t realize you wanted to go turn yourself in.”

“I don’t think he’d take us to the police,” Tim said.

“And what makes you say that?”

“Because there were plenty of times when he didn’t do it to Selina,” Tim said.

Jason huffed out a laugh and said, “Yeah, because he was hoping she’d peg him or something. Hot women get away with everything. I don’t think you and I would be so lucky.”

Tim shrugged like he didn’t care either way and said, “I was just a thought. Maybe it would blow up in our faces, I don’t know. But we need help, and Selina and Ivy and Harley are gone and Black Mask is a sociopath. I don’t know what it is, but something tells me Batman would help us.”

Jason’s mouth twisted into a wry frown, but he didn’t say anything.

“Like I said, it was just a thought,” Tim said.

“Yeah,” Jason said. “A thought.”

* * *

Up on the monitor, Barbara had pulled up the surveillance footage from one of the many cameras set up around the property. Harper and the others all watched, tense and silent, as Damian walked over to a boulder and let Titus off the leash.

When Damian was settled on the rock, Barbara fast forwarded through the video.

“ _There’s nothing until...here_ ,” she said, and the video slowed down to a normal speed again.

Damian kept drawing for another moment, but finally looked up. He said something they couldn’t hear, then something struck him in the neck. Harper’s pulse jumped, racing as Damian slumped to the ground in the video.

But it wasn’t over yet.

Two men in dark clothing walked up. One of them, the bigger of the two, had Titus in his arms. The dog was limp, probably drugged. He tied Titus to the tree while the other man went over to Damian and pulled out a knife. Harper’s stomach recoiled as the man cut the tracker out of Damian’s arm. He knew right where it would be.

When the tracker was out, he tossed it into the snow. Then the bigger man came over and slung Damian over his shoulder.

They left quickly, taking Damian with them. At no point were their faces visible, and they weren’t wearing anything with distinctive images or logos on it. They disappeared from the shot, and the screen went black.

Bruce turned and faced them all at the briefing table. Even Cullen was down in there with them this time, and he was as serious and alert as Cassandra. They were ready for Bruce’s orders.

“I have alerted Officer Gordon and the GCPD,” Bruce said. “From this point on, finding Damian is our priority. Luke and Kate are out in the city looking for him already. Cullen has offered to stay here and help comb through surveillance footage, and Barbara will be working on determining who these men are and how they got around our security. Alfred will stay with Carrie.”

Bruce looked at Harper next, and she braced herself.

“Huntress and Falconer have agreed to help us look for Damian. You will be assisting them,” Bruce told her. “Stay with them at all times. Someone out there is targeting us and the Sirens, so it is imperative that you do not get separated.”

Then Bruce looked over at Cassandra.

“Cassandra, you will be with me,” Bruce said.

“What about Agent Erikson?” Cassandra asked. “If Deathstroke and Black Mask hear we are...distracted, they will strike. Hurt her.”

“Agent Erikson is Gordon’s concern now.”

Cassandra’s mouth tightened in a frown, but she didn’t argue. Harper knew there was no way a police officer could protect someone from the likes of Deathstroke, but with Damian missing and potentially injured—or worse—there was no question that any of them would be focusing on anything else.

“I called Stephanie. I told her about Carrie and Damian,” Cassandra told him.

Bruce did not say anything for a moment. After a while, he nodded and said, “Good. Stephanie needs to know.”

“Is she out looking for him?” Harper asked. “Alone?”

Cassandra shook her head and said, “I don’t know. She did not say what she...would do.”

“ _What about the Sirens?_ ” Barbara asked.

“What about them?” Cullen asked, then seemed to realize he’d spoken a moment later, and blushed under the intensity of Bruce’s attention.

“I believe that what is happening to the Sirens may be connected to Damian’s abduction,” Bruce said. “Show them the graffiti, Barbara.”

An image of a beheaded bird appeared on the monitor. It had been spray painted on a fence.

“This was used to muzzle Titus,” Bruce said.

He picked something up off the table and showed it to them. It was a white scrap of fabric. The image of the beheaded bird had been scrawled on it with black paint.

* * *

“Does the warden take suggestions?” Dick asked his guard.

The guard in question was not Officer Lorence, but the other guy who watched Dick at night while he was sleeping.

“Excuse me?” he said.

His name was Officer Yates. He was also tall and, like Dick, had a look of being vaguely ethnic. Not Romani like Dick, though. Maybe Italian. He was much more talkative than Lorence, and Dick liked him more for that reason alone, even if he was kind of a douche.

“Does the warden take suggestions?” Dick asked again.

Officer Yates snorted and said, “Not from people like you.”

Dick looked around the otherwise empty cell and asked, “Where’s William?”

“Who?” Officer Yates asked.

“William? My cellmate? Big guy, brown hair? He’s not very talkative but I was kind of attached to him. Nothing bad happened to him, right?” Dick said.

“He got moved.”

Dick frowned and said, “What for?”

“Because the warden thinks you get too friendly and doesn’t want to give you anymore opportunities to make friends,” Officer Yates said.

“That’s rude,” Dick said.

“He has a point,” Yates said. “You’re way too chatty for your own good, just like Kyle. You’re going to get me in trouble if I’m not careful.”

“You’ve met Selina?” Dick asked, intrigued.

“Once, and she scratched the shit out of me. Now shut up,” Yates said.

Dick shrugged and leaned back on the bed, stretching his arms back and putting his hands behind his head. He was almost comfortable.

There was also a cell phone tucked into the waistband of his pants.

The cell phone was the mystery object that Basil had snuck into his pocket earlier that morning when he was tricking the guards into thinking he was going to drown Dick in clay. Dick was terrified that it was going to run out of battery life before he had an opportunity to use it. If only Officer Yates would _go away_.

Dick put one knee over the other and started whistling Hit Me Baby One More Time off-tune. One of the other inmates in a cell further down the block yelled at him to shut up. Dick didn’t.

“Can’t you just go to sleep?” Officer Yates said.

Dick stopped whistling and said, “It’s not my fault I’m not tired. I’m cooped up in here all day and I’m used to a much more active lifestyle.”

“Tragic,” Officer Yates said dryly.

Dick moved his knee out of the way and gave Officer Yates an appraising look. He had about the same build as Officer Lorence, but was younger and, in Dick’s opinion, more attractive. It was the facial hair, Dick thought. He’d always been a sucker for a nice beard. Dick wondered if Officer Yates would be amenable to seduction.

“I’m just saying,” Dick said, waving a hand. “Give me something to do, or it’ll be Britney Spears all night.”

“You’re going to get yourself shanked,” he said.

“That’s what you’re here for,” Dick said. “To protect me.”

Yates rolled his eyes and was maybe about to say something else, but then an alarm started going off down the block.

Dick sat up. Officer Yates was alert in an instant, turning toward the noise.

“Yates,” he said into his headset. “What—?”

Then Officer Yates pivoted and took off running without so much as a glance back at Dick.

The very second he was gone, the phone in Dick’s pocket began to vibrate.

Dick felt a thrill as he pulled the phone out from under his shirt. The caller ID just said “Unknown Caller”, and there was that gray person-shaped icon of the anonymous.

He pressed the answer button and put the phone to his ear.

“ _Hello Dick Grayson_ ,” said a mechanical voice.

Dick was disappointed. He’d been hoping to hear Selina’s voice.

“Uh, hello,” he said.

“ _How would you like to get out of Blackgate_?”

“I would love that,” Dick said, and he smiled, even though he knew the caller couldn’t see him.

“ _Good. I have a problem. If I get you out, then you are going to help me, or I will have you sent back to prison. Do you understand?”_

_The devil you don’t know_ , Dick thought, glancing back at the bars that lined the front of his cell.  In spite of himself, Dick was intrigued.

“I’m sorry, but what exactly am I getting myself into here?” he asked.

“ _Is that more important than freedom?_ ” the voice asked.

Dick didn't have to think about it. He really, really hated prison. The actual devil could’ve materialized in his cell and Dick would serve up his soul on a gold platter if it meant he could get out. He’d made a lot of stupid bargains in his lifetime, and they it hadn’t turned out all bad.

“You make a compelling point. I would like to be free again, please,” he said.

_“You will need to follow my instructions exactly. We don’t have much time._ ”

“Who is this?” Dick asked.

“ _An old friend. You can call me Oracle.”_


	16. Chapter Sixteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Who’s there?” Damian said. “Where am I?”

“Wake up!”

Something was touching Damian’s face.

“Wake up! Wake up! He’s no fun at all if he’s asleep!”

Something hard was jabbing into Damian’s cheek. He groaned and slowly opened his eyes, recognizing the lingering effects of a sedative even in his groggy state. He’d been drugged.

“He’s awake!” the voice said, and the jabbing stopped.

Damian blinked a couple of times before he was able to keep his eyes open, then took stock of his surroundings.

Where ever he was, it was dark. The little he could see—concrete, metal ramps—hinted that he was in some kind of warehouse. Everything was upside down.

Because he was upside down, he realized. He looked down at his feet—up at his feet—and saw that his arms and legs were bound to a chair. The chair was connected to a chain, and he was swaying slowly back and forth, the chain creaking a little as it moved. Damian had to shut his eyes again when a wave of dizziness overtook him. He was still in his thick winter coat and boots from earlier when he was drawing, but he was freezing. He didn’t know if it was really cold or if that was a side-effect of whatever it was he’d been drugged with.

“Who’s there?” Damian said. “Where am I?”

“Good morning, bird boy!” the voice said.

Damian recognized the voice. He willed his eyes to open again, and suddenly there he was, stepping out of the shadows.

The Joker. He was dressed exactly the way he had been the day Damian killed him—purple suit, shiny black shoes, wild green hair. It was as if he’d stepped out of the past unscathed.

The Joker smiled a huge smile and said, “Surprised to see me?”

“You,” Damian said.

“Me!” the Joker said. Then he laughed, a harsh, horrible laugh, and the sound echoed in the dark warehouse.

The Joker was holding something. Damian squinted at it, and recognized the soot-stained blade of a katana. That was the katana Damian had taken with him to Amusement Mile to fight Stray. Somehow the Joker had it.

Damian realized with a jolt that the Joker had to be the one who was behind the destruction of Amusement Mile. No doubt he was behind the graffiti as well. The Joker had been stalking him all along, planning his return. And he’d called Damian bird boy, and he had the katana Damian had used, but he’d abducted Damian from his father’s house, while he was not in his suit. But how could the Joker know his real identity?

“If it’s money you want, my father will pay you,” Damian said, deciding he would play dumb for now.

The Joker flourished the katana like a fencer with a sabre, swinging the blade too close to Damian’s face for comfort. Damian tipped his head back out of the way.

“You know what I’ve been just dying to know? How does a bat get a bird? Did he rob your mother's nest?” the Joker asked.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Damian said.

“There’s no need to pretend, boy chirper! Not with your old Uncle Joker,” the Joker said, swinging the katana again.

Damian twisted his wrists while Joker was distracted by the katana, testing the tightness of the ropes. They hardly gave at all, and Damian’s muscles were still weak from the sedative. He eyed the dark warehouse, but he didn’t see or hear anybody else. He would have to get himself out of this somehow.

“I can see your little bird brain whirring,” the Joker said. “You’re not going to wriggle out of here so easily, you know.”

Suddenly, the Joker thrust the katana at him. Damian jerked his head back, but the sharp side of the sword bit into his skin. Damian gritted his teeth and tipped his head back as far as it could go, until he was pressing the back of his skull into the wooden back of the chair. Fury flamed in Damian’s gut. He tested his bindings again, even though he knew it was no use.

“You’re supposed to be dead,” Damian hissed at him.

“I am! But Gotham is so much more funny with me around, don’t you agree?”

Damian glared at him. There were many things he wanted to say, but he was still trying to pretend that he was just Damian Wayne, son of Bruce Wayne—not Rook, son of Batman.

But he didn’t need to voice any of his threats out loud. The Joker must have caught the furious gleam in Damian’s eye, because he smiled, delighted and wild with mania.

“Don’t you ever go to the movies? If you want something dead, you have to cut off it’s head,” the Joker told him.

The blade pressed into Damian’s skin. Damian gritted his teeth at the sting, and could feel his own hot blood dripping down his chin.

“I could kill you right now, but that would be no fun at all,” the Joker said.

“What are you planning?” Damian asked, ignoring the pain.

The Joker didn’t answer. Suddenly the blade was gone, and Damian watched as he tossed it into the darkness. It clattered against something and hit the ground.

“All in due time, my feathered friend. I can’t tell you yet. That would spoil all of my surprises!”

Then the Joker went away laughing, leaving Damian hanging alone in the dark.

* * *

Lonnie was home when Stephanie got back with her dinner. He looked up at her from his computer when she came in. Then he looked down at the Bat Burger bag in her hand. He stared at it for a moment, then frowned up at her.

She pointed a jokerized fry at him and said, “Don’t start.”

“I wouldn’t even know where to begin,” he said.

“Look, I think it’s gross too, but you have to admit that the secret Riddler sauce is badass.”

Lonnie cocked a blond eyebrow and said, “I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been to Bat Burger.”

“Your loss,” Stephanie said. She shoved another jokerized fry into her mouth just to annoy him and went down the hall to “her” room.

Of course, it wasn’t her room at all. She was only borrowing it for a week or two until Lonnie’s roommate got back to Gotham after winter break. She had no idea what she was going to do after that.

She kicked the door shut behind her and dropped the Bat Burger bag on the desk. She turned on the desk lamp and then pulled her coat off, turning to put it in the closet. That was when she spotted something sitting on the bed.

It was a small purple box tied with a white ribbon.

Stephanie groaned and dropped her jacket on the floor on her way over to open the box. She ripped the ribbon off without finesse and tossed the lid across the room.

Inside the fancy box there was a purple domino mask sitting on white silk. Stephanie glared down at it, hoping Barbara could see exactly how annoyed she was.

Then she noticed the note. Stephanie pulled it out from under the mask and opened it, recognizing Cass’s handwriting right away.

_Stephanie_ , the note said. _Please wear this if you go out on patrol. Your life could be in danger too. Please do not get hurt._ — _Black Bat_

Stephanie felt a little bit better knowing the domino mask was from Cass and not Barbara or Bruce. But not much better.

“I’m not doing it,” she said, and dropped the purple box back on the bed. The domino mask flopped out of the box and onto the mattress, landing just right so that the two eye holes were facing her.

“Great,” she muttered.

She went back to the desk and sat down in the desk chair. She opened the Bat Burger bag and pulled out her hamburger. She unwrapped it and took a huge bite, hating herself for loving the Riddler sauce so much.

Lonnie rapped his knuckles on her door.

“What?” she said, her mouth still full. She didn’t tell him to come in.

“Are you talking to yourself?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Can I come in?”

“Fine,” she said.

Lonnie opened the door. He took in her at the desk eating her hamburger. Then he looked over at the bed and saw the domino mask.

He pointed at it and said, “Where did that come from?”

Stephanie jerked her head at the windows.

“You know I don’t like the Bats coming here,” he said.

“You know they’re all stalkers and I can’t stop them from breaking in.”

“I thought you told them to not come here again.”

“I did say that, but there’s shit going on so they’re all jumpy,” she said.

That made her think about Damian again, which was the one thing she was trying _not_ to think about. She’d spent two hours pacing in her room, trying to convince herself not to go out looking for him. Then she took her Spoiler suit off and went to Bat Burger instead, but her head still wouldn’t shut up.

_He’s not my problem,_ she reminded herself. _Damian has Bruce and Cass and Harper to look out for him._

Lonnie sighed and asked, “Is that thing watching everything we do and say?”

Stephanie shrugged and said, “Probably.”

“Great. Put it in the trash chute,” he said, and turned to leave, pulling the door shut behind him as he went.

Stephanie leaned back in the desk chair that didn’t belong to her and finished her hamburger.

Even back when she was Batgirl, Stephanie had never liked the domino mask. She only wore it because Barbara insisted. Because Carrie died, and Barbara stupidly thought that if she had been able to keep a closer eye on Carrie then maybe the Joker wouldn’t have killed her. But all the mask had meant for Stephanie was that Bruce could also watch everything she did, and pick apart all of her weaknesses and failures and compare her to Carrie and try to make her into somebody she wasn’t and never would be.  

And now it turned out that Carrie as alive anyway. Bruce got his perfect Batgirl back, and Stephanie could officially fade into mediocrity.

Except it appeared that Cass wouldn’t let Stephanie do this.

When her hamburger was gone, Stephanie tossed the wrapper in the trash and went over to the bed to pick up the mask.

It wasn’t her old Batgirl mask. She’d tossed that thing ages ago, after committing patricide, becoming a blemish on the Batgirl legacy, and retiring in shame. As one does. This was a new mask, made with her Spoiler aesthetic in mind. It was heavier and larger than her old mask. Stephanie had no doubt that Barbara had been holding onto it for a while, waiting for an appropriate moment to offer it to her.

Without even really knowing why she was doing it, Stephanie started to put the mask on. As soon as she had the communicator attached, she said, “Oracle?”

“ _Spoiler_?”

That wasn’t Oracle’s voice. That was Cass’s voice.

“Black Bat,” Stephanie said.

“ _Are you going on patrol_?” Cassandra said.

Stephanie didn’t answer the question. Instead she said, “What do you want?”

There was a pause, but Cass didn't answer Stephanie's question either. Instead she said, “ _I am looking for Rook with Batman._ ”

“What about the others?”

“ _Batgirl is with Falconer and Huntress in The Bowery. Batwoman and Batwing are looking for him in Chinatown_ ,” Cass said.

So that was everyone, then. Bruce was even deigning to work with Helena and her new partner.

“ _What about you_?” Cass asked.

“What about me?”

“ _What are you...going to do_?”

“Nothing,” Stephanie said.

Cass didn’t respond.

“I’m hanging up now,” Stephanie said.

“ _Keep the mask on_ ,” Cass said. “ _Please_.”

“I’m going to watch the latest season of Queer Eye and go to bed early,” Stephanie said.

“ _Spoiler_ ,” Cass said, but Stephanie disconnected the line.

Then Stephanie tugged her hoodie over her head and tossed it on the floor with her jacket. She went back over to the bed and pulled the box out from under it, opening the lid to reveal her Spoiler suit.

She wasn’t going to look for Damian. She was done with Bat business—it always blew up in her face, and besides, now that she knew Bruce, Harper, Cass, Kate, Luke, and even Helena and that Duke kid were out looking for Damian, she was positive that there was nothing much she could do to help. There had never been anything that she could do that the other Bats couldn’t do just as well, or better.

But Spoiler could help one person.

Stephanie put on her suit and got ready for patrol. Queer Eye was going to have to wait.

* * *

“So basically your idea is to cause as much chaos as possible and sneak Dick out while everyone is panicking,” Tim said.

“Yes,” Jason said.

Tim sighed. He’d been pacing back and forth across Dick’s apartment while Jason explained his plan to get Dick out of Blackgate.

“That is such a Harley way of planning something. You’re going to get us both shot. Are you forgetting that we’re not bulletproof?” Tim asked.

Jason ignored the meta and his possibly accurate assessment of his plan as he eyed Dick’s apartment again.

It had been Tim’s idea to use Dick’s apartment as a temporary safe house, but the longer they stayed there, the more Jason regretted agreeing to it. Somehow it was even messier than when Jason and Tim had been there with Dick a few days ago. Jason didn’t understand how it was possible that Dick had _so much_ stuff.

“If my plan sucks, then tell me your idea,” Jason said, because he needed something to distract him from the compulsion to clean.

“Well, it’s not quite as enthusiastic as your plan,” Tim said.

Tim opened his mouth to go on, but suddenly there was a crash in the bedroom, like something glass had been knocked over.

Jason and Tim looked at each other, and without speaking, Jason got up and pulled his club out of the strap around his back. They both waited.

Then the bedroom door opened, and Dick strolled out.

“Hey guys,” Dick said. He was unbuttoning a tan jumpsuit and pulling his arms out of the sleeves to push it down to his hips.

Jason and Tim balked at him.

“Miss me?” Dick said.

Jason set his club down on the ottoman and crossed the apartment. Without saying anything at all, he pulled Dick into a hug and slapped him on the back.

Dick’s chest rumbled when he chuckled, and he hugged Jason back.

“So you did miss me,” Dick said.

Jason finally let Dick go and they turned to Tim, who looked Dick up and down. “But—how—? They didn’t let you go?”

“God no. Somebody who calls themselves Oracle got me out,” Dick said.

At once, Jason and Tim said, “Oracle?”

Dick shrugged and said, “Yeah, I have no idea. They say they’re an old friend, but they won’t tell me anything more than that. I was hoping you two would know.”

Jason and Tim glanced at each other, then looked back to Dick and shook their heads.

“Dick,” Tim said. He looked guilty, and Jason figured he knew what Tim was going to say next. “We were making plans to break you out of Blackgate. We weren’t just going to leave you to rot in prison.”

“Yeah. That’s what we were just discussing now. We would’ve done it sooner, except everything’s kind of fallen to shit,” Jason said.

Dick put a hand on Jason’s shoulder and said, “It’s fine. I’m out now, and that’s what matters. Where’s Ivy and Selina?”

Tim and Jason exchanged another look. Dick caught the look and said, “That doesn’t bode well.”

“There’s...some stuff you should know,” Tim said.

“Oh?” Dick said, and he started to strip out of the jumpsuit.

Jason made a face and Tim held up a hand to block his sight as Dick pushed the jumpsuit over his hips. The fabric puddled at his feet and Dick stepped away from it, kicking it into some cluttered corner of the apartment. Then the only thing covering him was a very beige pair of tighty whities.

“Really dude?” Jason said.

But Dick just smiled and said, “Tell me what I missed.”

“Ivy and Selina are missing. We still don’t know where Harley is. And it gets worse,” Tim said.  

“That explains why I didn’t get word from Selina while I was in Blackgate, but how could it get worse than them being missing?” Dick asked.

Tim winced, and Jason said, “We broke into Arkham Asylum to see if anybody in the secure wing had seen or heard from Harley. Most of the assholes in there weren’t interested in helping us, but Riddler told us that the Joker is behind Harley’s disappearance.”

Dick frowned.

“But the Joker’s dead,” Dick said.

“That’s what I said, but in a way it makes sense,” Tim said, shrugging. “His body was never found. It would be in character for him to want to taunt Jason and Harley by disrupting their civilian lives.”

“Whether it’s the Joker or not, we still don’t have any clue what happened to the Sirens. At some point they just vanished, and we haven’t heard from them since,” Jason said.

Dick sighed. He seemed to think for a minute, and then he turned away, heading into the kitchen.

Jason and Tim watched as Dick hunted around in the kitchen for the components he needed to make a bowl of cereal. He sniffed at the milk before he poured it on top of his Lucky Charms, then scooped up a giant spoonful and shoved it into his mouth. He tipped his head back and groaned as he chewed.

His mouth was still full when he said, “Sorry. Believe it or not, prison food is crap. Don’t ever get arrested.”

“We do try to avoid it,” Jason said.

“How can you be so sure you can trust this Oracle person?” Tim asked.

Dick shoved another spoon full of Lucky Charms into his mouth and shrugged.

“I’m not, but I wanted to get out of prison, so,” Dick said, and he shrugged a second time.

“So you just...made a deal with this person you don’t even know? What if they’re connected to the Joker?” Tim asked.

“Trust me. If you had been in my place you would’ve done the same thing. But something is telling me that whoever this Oracle person is, they’re not working on the same side as the Joker,” Dick said.

“How are you so sure? Tricking people is the Joker’s joie de vivre,” Jason said.

“Before Oracle let me out, I had to agree to a bargain. Oracle wants us to help find Rook,” Dick said.

Tim said, “Us?” at the same time that Jason said, “Find Rook?”

Dick nodded and said, “Yes. Apparently he’s missing too.”

“The little bastard got you arrested. Why do we care if he’s missing?” Jason said.

Dick shook his head and said, “He didn’t get me arrested. I could’ve gotten away. But we don’t have time for that story right now. If we don’t help find Rook, then Oracle is going to have me sent back to Blackgate.”

“They can do that?” Tim asked.

“They got me out, didn’t they?” Dick said, wiping some milk off his chin.

Jason and Tim exchanged a glance.

“Well that’s inconvenient,” Jason said.

* * *

Imogen enjoyed the steam and the heat of the bathroom post shower for a little while before she finally stepped into the hall and flipped on the light.

“Hello Agent Erikson.”

Imogen shrieked and almost lost her towel.

There was a girl in her hallway. She was leaning up against the floral wallpaper with her arms crossed over her chest. Her outfit was purple and black, and her eyes were covered by a mask. Long blonde hair streamed out of her hood.

“Jesus,” Imogen said, and put a hand over her racing heart.

She hadn’t been in Gotham for that long and she couldn’t remember if this was one of the good masks or the bad masks. There were _so many_ masks in Gotham. It was a pity she didn’t have her gun, but then she hadn’t thought she would need it in the shower.

“Who are you? Are you one of the good guys or one of the bad guys?” Imogen asked.

“You don’t know me?” the girl asked.

She sounded offended, but most of her face was covered, so Imogen couldn’t tell for sure.

“Should I?” Imogen asked.

“I’m Spoiler,” the girl said, as if that was supposed to mean something to Imogen. “I used to work for Batman.”

Imogen relaxed slightly.

“Used to? How come you don’t anymore?” Imogen asked.

Spoiler scoffed and stood up straight. She pushed away from the wall, saying, “I don’t feel like telling that story tonight.”

“Will you at least tell me what you’re doing in my apartment? Or when exactly you plan to leave?” Imogen asked. It was freezing in the hallway, and she was starting to shiver.

“Go ahead and get dressed. I’ll explain everything,” Spoiler said. Then she walked right by Imogen down the hall into the den.

“Make yourself at home,” Imogen said. Spoiler didn’t respond to the sarcasm, and Imogen did go to her bedroom and put on some clothes.

She heard the TV turn on while she was debating about whether or not to put on normal clothes or pajamas. She’d been looking forward to putting on her pajamas after her shower, but now there was a masked vigilante in her living room—her sister was never going to believe it—and pajamas seemed out of the question. She put on jeans and a sweatshirt instead. She got her gun too.

When she came into the den, Spoiler was sitting on the couch watching the news. One arm was slung over the back cushion and she had one of her boots up on the coffee table.

On the TV, Vicki Vale was saying, “ _We’ve just received news that Dick Grayson, the main suspect in the Stray case, has escaped from Blackgate. An anonymous source hinted that Grayson may have had help from someone on the outside_ —”

“The gun’s a good idea. You might need it,” Spoiler said.

“What gun?” Imogen said.

“Do I look stupid?”

“You didn’t even look at me. How did you know?” Imogen asked.

“You’re a cop,” Spoiler said, as if that explained everything.

Imogen sat in the chair diagonal from Spoiler.

“What are you doing in my apartment?” Imogen asked.

“I’m here to protect you,” Spoiler said.

“From Roman Sionis and his men?”

“Yes,” Spoiler said. “From Roman Sionis.”

“There are already people looking out for me,” Imogen told her.

“If you’re referring to the police officer downstairs in the gold sedan, yes, I know,” Spoiler said.

That was Officer Conrad. He was the officer who was assigned to watch Imogen’s apartment building at night for any suspicious activity.

“I can take care of myself too,” Imogen said.

“Of course,” Spoiler said, in a guileless sort of way.

Imogen narrowed her eyes at Spoiler, but Spoiler didn’t look away from the TV. Sure, maybe Imogen had gotten a little relaxed over the past couple of days. But weeks had gone by since Black Mask’s threat, and nothing bad had happened yet. A little part of her had been wondering if Black Mask wasn’t all talk.

Spoiler’s sudden appearance suggested otherwise.

“So Batman didn’t send you?” Imogen asked her.

“It’s complicated.”

“Then explain it to me,” Imogen said.

Spoiler sighed.

“Batman’s had Black Bat and Batwing watching over you to make sure nothing bad happens, but now they’re preoccupied by a different problem. I’m here now because they can’t be here.”

Imogen couldn’t remember which ones exactly were Black Bat and Batwing, and it was weird to think that they had been watching her without her knowing about it, even if they had good intentions. Maybe her mother was right and she never should’ve moved to Gotham.

“Why would Batman need to have Batwing and Black Bat looking out for me?” Imogen asked.

There was a pause where Spoiler didn’t speak or look away from the TV. Imogen had a sense that there were things going on she didn't know about, and she didn't like that at all.

“Black Mask may have hired...outside help,” Spoiler said.

“To kill me?” Imogen asked.

“It’s unclear what exactly he hired the outside help for right now. That’s why Batman had people watching over you. Just in case.”

Imogen sat back in the chair, thinking over this.

“Maybe I should just leave town,” she said.

“It won’t make any difference if you do,” Spoiler said. “At least if you stay in Gotham, Batman has the opportunity to protect you from anybody who may want to hurt you.”

“That’s easy for you to say. You’re not the one who has Black Mask out there threatening to have her killed,” Imogen said.

Spoiler snorted and said, “I worked for Batman. Every villain who works in Gotham has tried or wanted to kill me at some point.”

Spoiler said this all in a matter-of-fact sort of way, and Imogen thought to herself that Spoiler seemed awfully young to be making such statements. The longer she stayed in Gotham, the more she felt like she’d wandered out of the real world into some kind of hellish nightmare realm. If Black Mask didn’t have her killed first, she was moving to Portland.

“Can you fight them? Whoever this outside help is?” Imogen asked Spoiler.

“I was trained by Batman,” Spoiler said, and Imogen could definitely tell she was annoyed now. “I can at least keep him from killing you.”

Imogen didn’t really know what that meant, and was about to ask, but the TV glitched and the screen went dark. Spoiler and Imogen looked back over at it as the sound whined and the screen went all fuzzy.

Spoiler stood up just as the picture came back.

“ _Good evening, citizens of Gotham!_ ”

On the TV screen, right next to the camera so that all they could see was his face, was the Joker. Imogen hadn't been in Gotham long, but she knew him when she saw him.

“ _Have you missed me_?” he asked.

Spoiler swore, and the Joker laughed, long and loud. The sound made Imogen’s skin crawl.

“That’s not possible. He’s dead,” Imogen said. Spoiler said nothing.

“ _Since I'm returning to Gotham, I’ve decided to get my family back together!_ ”

He moved back from the camera, revealing Harley Quinn. They were standing in what looked like a dark newsroom, and she was decked out in black and red. When he went over to her she threw her arms around his waist and beamed up at him.

“ _Mister J is back and it’s a miracle!_ ” she said. Her eyes were very wide.

“ _And what would a miracle be without a little mayhem?_ ” the Joker asked. He pushed Harley away and suddenly he was right up next to the screen again. “ _While I was away, I learned the most fascinating things about our dearest Caped Crusader! I even found his little bird!”_

The Joker pushed the camera and it panned over to a different part of the newsroom. Imogen heard the sharp intake of Spoiler’s breath and understood why.

There was a child sitting in a chair. There was a black carnival mask covering the top part of his face. The lower half of the mask, the part covering the boy’s nose, was pointed like a bird’s beak. His arms were restrained behind his back and he was slumped over in the seat, apparently unconscious.

“ _This little brat tried his hardest to kill me! Batman can’t blame me if I hold a grudge._ ”

The camera was pulled away from the boy, and the Joker was large on the screen again, so close that Imogen could hear how harshly he was breathing. He was fogging up the lens.

“ _To celebrate my return, I’m throwing parties all around Gotham. Batman’s whole family is invited!_ ”

Imogen tore her eyes away from the screen to look at Spoiler, but Spoiler was still as statue. She didn't look away from the TV.

_“The first celebration is happening at Gotham’s Clock Tower. Surprise! I hope Batman makes it to the party on time!_ ”

Then the Joker laughed again, throwing his head back and cackling, and Imogen could see all of his oddly long and yellowing teeth.

The video cut out and the screen went dark.


	17. Chapter Seventeen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “What do we do?” Cullen asked. “Does this mean the Joker took Damian from the house? Does he know who all of us are? Are we in danger?”

The computer’s alarms were still blaring when the car drove around the corner and pulled into the cave. Cullen swiveled in the computer chair and watched it approach. As soon as the roaring engine cut off, both doors opened and Batman and Black Bat climbed out.

“Alfred!” Bruce yelled.

Alfred wasn’t down in the cave, but Bruce didn’t yell for Alfred again. Instead Cass ran up the stairs to the medbay. She fetched a stretcher from one of the cabinets and immediately ran back down the stairs to the car, jumping down the last few steps to join Bruce again.

Cullen watched as Cass and Bruce lifted Barbara out of the back of the car and onto the stretcher. Barbara’s clothes and skin were coated in ash, and there was some kind of plastic mask over the lower half of her face. Her arms hung toward the ground, limp, and her head was lolled back.

Together Bruce and Cass picked up the stretcher and carried it up the stairs.

This, finally, spurred Cullen into action. He grabbed his crutches and got up. He was almost fast enough to meet Bruce and Cass before they took Barbara the rest of the way on toward the medbay, but he couldn’t keep up with them. By the time he caught up, Bruce and Cass had already transferred Barbara to the bed.

“Where’s Alfred?” Bruce asked him. Behind him, Cassandra was setting up an oxygen tank.

“He had to take Carrie upstairs,” Cullen said. “Joker’s message played on the computer and it made her have some kind of panic attack.”

“Computer, silence alarms,” Bruce said.

All the noise abruptly shut off. Cullen turned and looked back at the computer screen, and saw that all of the alerts and videos were still playing, though they were now muted.

He turned back in time to see Bruce pull the mask off Barbara’s face and replace it with a new one. Now that the cave was quiet again, he could hear how loudly Barbara was breathing.

“Is she going to be ok?” Cullen asked.

Bruce didn’t answer the question. Instead he said, “We’ll need the extra wheelchair, Cassandra.”

“Yes,” Cassandra said, and turned at once and left, heading to the elevator.

For a few minutes Cullen watched as Bruce fussed around Barbara. He did some tests and made the occasional grunt, or told the computer things about Barbara’s condition. Barbara didn’t wake up.

Finally, Cass returned with the extra wheelchair.

“Carrie?” Bruce said.

“I think she will be fine,” Cass said. “Caught off guard. Frightened. Alfred is...staying with her.”

Bruce grunted.

“What happened? Did they put the fire out?” Cullen asked.

Cullen was only supposed to be going through surveillance footage, but the computer was apparently programmed to pick up on police and fire communications. Cullen had listened helplessly as all the calls started coming in about explosions inside the Clock Tower where Oracle had her secret base of operations. Then video windows with news programs started popping up on the monitor and everyone on the TV was freaking out about Joker and bombs. Without Oracle out there to tell him what was happening, he could only watch and fear the worst.

“The Clock Tower is gone,” Bruce said.

“But Barbara is safe. She will be ok,” Cassandra said.

Bruce put a hand on Barbara’s shoulder, and for a moment, none of them said anything, and the only sound was Barbara’s harsh breathing. She still hadn’t opened her eyes, but if Cass and Bruce both thought she would be ok, then that made him feel a little better. He didn’t know Barbara all that well, but Harper talked about her all the time. It was hard not to worship the first Batgirl at least a little bit.

Finally though, Cullen couldn’t take the suspense anymore. Questions he’d been wondering since the Joker’s message aired were all he could think about. He had to have answers or he was going to have a panic attack like Carrie.

Maybe he would have one anyway.

“What do we do?” Cullen asked. “Does this mean the Joker took Damian from the house? Does he know who all of us are? Are we in danger?”

Bruce frowned, but neither of them answered the question.

Instead Bruce looked over at him, still frowning, and said, “Oracle succeeded in getting Dick Grayson out of Blackgate, correct?”

Cullen nodded and said, “She told us she was talking to him for a little while, but she ended the call after he made it off the island.”

“Do you know where he went once he returned to the mainland?” Bruce asked.

Cullen shrugged and shook his head, but he had overheard bits and pieces about what was happening with Stray when Barbara and Alfred were talking about him earlier. So he said, “She said that he was supposed to wait for her next call. I think he agreed to help her look for Rook.”

“Good,” Bruce said.

Bruce turned and left the medbay. Cullen was going to stay with Cass and Barbara, but then Bruce said, “Cullen, a word?”

Cullen flinched, and he followed Bruce back over to the computer.

When he reached Bruce, Bruce said, “I am sorry to put this on you, but we don’t have a whole lot of options. Until Barbara is better, I will need you to monitor the computer.”

Cullen felt like the ground had dropped out from under him.

“You want me to take over for Oracle?” Cullen asked. He didn’t even know what all of the buttons on the computer’s massive keyboard did.

“Computer, activate voice control for Row, Cullen,” Bruce said.

“ _Voice control activated for Row, Cullen,_ ” the computer said.

“Just listen to the police scanners and let me know if you hear anything concerning. It understands most verbal commands, and if you ever need to reach me, all you have to do is call me Batman. It will patch you through automatically. Also, I need you to contact Batgirl to let her know that her assignment is changing. She should be ready for me to send her her updated mission,” Bruce said.

Cullen’s throat was too dry for him to be able to say anything, so he just nodded.

“In the meantime, I need you, Alfred, and Carrie to be on your guard. The house could be compromised, so they will need to return to the cave. If you discover that the cave has been compromised as well, all of you need to go to the safe room and stay there until I can make it back.”

“Ok,” Cullen said, because it seemed like the only thing to say.

Bruce nodded, then turned at once and walked away, heading back for the stairs.

“Wait!” Cullen said, and Bruce stopped.

“Where are you going?” Cullen asked.

He heard how childish the question sounded. Bruce wasn’t _his_ dad. And yet.

For a beat, Bruce was silent.

Finally he said, “I’ll be in touch, Cullen,” and he left.

* * *

Jason had been pacing back and forth across Dick’s apartment ever since Joker’s message aired on TV.

“Harley wouldn’t do this,” he said for the thousandth time. “She wouldn’t do it. There’s no fucking way.”

Dick was in the process of trying to squeeze into his old Stray suit, since his old one was now the official property of the GCPD. Even after starving for a few days because of terrible prison food, though, the suit didn’t seem to want to fit over his hips.

“No one is saying it, Jay,” Dick told him. “Of course he’s threatening Harley somehow, but we’re going to get her back.”

Jason did not seem to be soothed by this in the slightest. He just shook his head, so jerkily that it had to hurt his neck.

“We can’t know anything right now,” Tim said. He was sitting cross-legged on top of Dick’s ottoman, shoulders stiff and tense as he watched Jason pace.

“Harley wouldn’t go back to him. She wouldn’t do it. You saw the look on her face, Tim. She was terrified,” Jason said.

Tim said, “And you’re probably right about that, but—”

“There’s no probably about it! I know Harley! She had a thousand opportunities to go back to him before he died and she didn’t. She’s married to Ivy now and she’s happy. She would never do this to Ivy. That bastard is doing something it to keep her at his side, and I’m going to fucking kill him.”

“You getting upset and rushing into danger for Harley is what Joker wants,” Tim said.

“It’s not like we have any idea where he is,” Dick said. He sucked in a breath and was finally able to get the zipper up over his pecs.

“Then I guess I’ll just have to go out and find the bastard,” Jason said. He turned suddenly and picked up his club off the floor. He made a beeline for the door.

“Jason, no—” Tim said, getting up to stop him.

Dick lunged over the kitchen counter and grabbed his spare whip off the table. Before Jason could make it to the door, Dick snapped it, not close enough to actually hit Jason, but close enough that Jason would be able to feel the fact that it had almost hit him. Jason lurched to a stop and narrowed his eyes at him.

Dick pointed at him.

“We can’t split up. We’re easier targets if we split up.” He cracked the whip again, letting it snap a little closer this time, and said, “I will use this.”

“Dick’s right. We have a better chance if we stay together and work as a team,” Tim said.

Jason glared at Dick for another tense moment, apparently ignoring Tim altogether.

Finally though, he started muttering about how ridiculous Dick looked and what he was going to do to get back at him when Dick least suspected it. He went around Tim back to the den and started pacing again, and eventually the muttering turned away from Dick and back toward the subject of the Joker.

Tim and Dick watched him for a minute. Then, under his breath, Tim said, “If we’re going to have any hope of rescuing the Sirens, we’ll need a plan.”

Dick blew a stray lock of hair out of his face and nodded, saying, “Yeah, and that’s the hard part. How are we—”

He didn’t finish the sentence because the phone started buzzing on the counter.

Not his cell phone. _The_ cell phone. The one from Oracle.

Tim, Jason, and Dick all looked at it for a moment before Dick went over to it and checked the screen. Like before, the caller ID said Unknown Caller.

Dick pressed the answer button and put the phone to his ear.

“Oracle?” Dick said.

“ _Richard Grayson_ ,” the mechanical voice said. “ _Have you located Nightshade and Jack of Clubs_?”

Dick glanced over at the other two boys and said, “I have.”

“ _Good. I believe that we can help each other_ ,” Oracle said.

“I’m listening,” Dick said.

“ _Meet me at the vacant Wayne Enterprises building over on the East Side_ ,” Oracle said. “ _I will text you the address._ ”

“No need, I’m familiar,” Dick said, and frowned. It was the building where Tim attempted to build a lab in the basement, but he was thwarted when Selina said it wasn’t a good idea.

“ _Good_ ,” Oracle said. “ _3 a.m. sharp. Bring the other two with you._ ”

“I think I can manage that,” Dick said. Then he smiled again, even though he knew Oracle still couldn’t see him. Pleasantly, he added, “We will, of course, be armed. I assume you will be as well, so it seems only fair.”

Oracle made a thoughtful sound and said, “ _Thank you for the warning_.” They didn’t sound particularly concerned.

The phone beeped, and Dick took it away from his ear and looked at the screen. Oracle had hung up.

“What do they want?” Tim asked.

“To meet us,” Dick said.

“Really?” Jason said, and at the same time Tim asked, “Is that a good idea?”

“Oracle wants to help us. All of us,” Dick said, and checked the time. They only had about thirty minutes to make their way over to the East Side.

“Come on,” Dick said, jerking his head at the door. “We don’t have much time to get there, and something tells me it would be a really bad idea to be late.”

* * *

Oracle hadn’t told them to go down to the basement, but it was the spot Tim liked, so that was where they went. If the other two were comforted by familiarity, then Dick wasn’t about to argue with them.

When they reached the basement, Dick went over to a panel of switches on the wall and tried one. He was pleasantly surprised when some of the lights flickered on.

“We have power,” Dick said, looking around at the bare expanse of concrete.

Tim grunted, but Jason didn’t say anything. He was still pissy at Dick for threatening him with the whip, and had made it perfectly clear that he thought meeting Oracle was a waste of time, potentially even a trap. Dick didn’t altogether disagree with him. There was a chance this was a terrible idea.

None of them spoke as they checked the place out, looking behind abandoned cubicles and concrete pillars just to make sure they were really alone. The darkness turned up nothing, only dust and a few items that must’ve been left over from when Tim or the old WE employees were using it.

They met in the center again. Dick looked over at Tim and said, “What were you going to do with this place anyway?”

“A lab,” Tim said.

“Yeah, I know, but what was the lab for? I thought science experiments were Ivy’s thing.”

Tim frowned, and for a minute Dick thought he wasn’t going to answer the question.

But Tim shrugged and said, “I was trying to work on the formula.”

“Formula?” Dick said.

“So people can touch him,” Jason snapped. “The vaccine that Ivy gave to Harley and me.”

Dick glanced back over at Tim, frowning now too.

But Dick didn’t have the chance to ask Tim anything else about this formula, because Jason walked over to Dick and said, “It’s officially 3 a.m. Where the fuck is this guy?”

“You don’t know Oracle’s a guy,” Tim said.

“Ok fine. Where the fuck is this person?” Jason said.

“I don’t know,” Dick said. He checked the phone screen again, but there were no more texts, no missed calls.

Jason glowered at him and stalked over to Tim.

The minutes dragged on as they waited in the basement, quiet and listening for any signs of an intruder.

Dick had always been bad at standing still, so he wandered around the basement some more. After a while of pointless wandering around to the four corners of the dark and clammy space, Dick took Oracle’s phone out of his pocket and stared down at the screen, as if that would make them call.

Ten minutes passed this way.

Oracle still hadn’t appeared and Jason was yawning when Tim shook his head and said, “I don’t like this. Why aren’t they here yet? Maybe we should leave.”

“Yeah, I hate to break it to you, Dickweed, but it really seems like this person isn’t coming,” Jason said.

Dick said nothing. He didn’t know what it was about Oracle, but something about them had struck him as familiar. They said they were an old friend, and he could tell from the way they talked that they understood how his mind worked. They hadn’t asked him to do anything in the prison that he wasn’t able to pull off. Whoever Oracle was, he was almost positive that they were telling the truth when they said they didn’t have malicious intent.

But he also knew Jason and Tim weren’t used to trusting people. If either of them decided to leave—Tim in particular—there wasn't much Dick could do to stop them.

“We’ll stay for another couple of minutes. If Oracle still hasn’t showed by then—”

Dick stopped speaking abruptly and listened. Tim and Jason eyed him curiously, but Dick just held a hand up, motioning at them to be silent.

Something was different. Dick wasn’t sure how he could tell, but somehow suddenly he was certain they weren’t alone. His arms prickled with goosebumps.

Tim sucked in a harsh breath and backed away from the west corner of the basement. Dick turned at once and faced that direction, but he didn’t see anything. Only shadow behind a pillar.

No—not just shadow. Something about the darkness was too _heavy_.

In the gloom, something shifted. The thing took on shape and straightened and Batman stepped into the weak light.

“Oh, fuck,” Jason said.

Dick didn’t repeat the sentiment, but he agreed with it. He lifted up his hand to grab the handle of his whip.

For a long, terrifying moment, Batman didn’t say anything. The dim lamplight seemed to not want to touch him. It was like he was all void and nothing, a black hole swallowing brightness, and the cape swirled around him as if it was being rustled by a phantom wind.

“Stray. Jack of Clubs. Nightshade,” he said at last.

There was another silent pause, but Jason and Tim didn’t say anything.

Dick decided to be their spokesperson. It was only right, considering he was the one who got them into this mess.

“Batman,” he said, smiling at the Caped Crusader. “Fancy meeting you here.”

Batman’s head turned slightly in Dick’s direction. No matter how many times Dick saw those white eye holes looking his way, he never got used to it.

“Where’s Oracle? Are you Oracle?” Dick asked him.

“Oracle isn’t coming,” Batman said. “She’s indisposed at the moment.”

Tim looked over at Jason and raised his eyebrows as if to say, _What did I tell you?_ Jason just glared back at him. Oracle apparently was a woman after all, and Dick thought this was interesting, but he also thought Jason and Tim should focus.

“So Oracle works for you?” Dick asked Batman, and Tim and Jason both returned their attention to the Bat.

Batman didn’t answer the question, but Dick didn’t really think he needed to. It was obvious that she did.

“If this is about the kid, we swear we didn’t do anything to him. We’re not working with the Joker,” Dick said.

Batman didn’t respond. Dick didn’t think this was a good sign.

Instead, Batman looked over at Jason and asked, “Were you aware that the Joker had returned to Gotham?”

Jason and Tim exchanged what Dick thought was a pretty obvious look. But it was Tim who spoke, not Jason, hesitantly at first, but more confidently as he went on.

“We broke into Arkham Asylum. Riddler was there and he warned us that the Joker was behind the Sirens’ disappearances, but we didn’t know for sure until he aired his message tonight. At least, we didn’t know that Harley’s disappearance was his fault.” Tim shrugged.

“Is Poison Ivy also missing?” Batman asked.

Tim nodded and said, “Yes. She vanished not long after Dick was arrested. We were split up all over the city looking for Harley, and at some point she stopped contacting me. We have no idea what happened to her or to Selina.”

Batman grunted thoughtfully.

Jason hissed out a breath and said, “Jesus, Tim. Why don’t you draw him a map to our apartment and invite him over for coffee?”

“He can help us find them,” Tim whispered back, not at all quiet enough that Batman wouldn’t be able to hear them. “Isn’t that what we want?”

“If he finds them”—Jason jabbed his thumb at Batman—“he’s just going to throw them in Arkham.”

“Better Arkham than dead. They’ve broken out of Arkham before. They can do it again.”

“Guys,” Dick warned.

Jason and Tim fell silent, and Dick returned all of his attention to Batman, who had been observing the argument silently.

“What is it that you want from us?” Dick asked him. “We don’t know where the Sirens are and we haven’t seen your kid.”

Batman didn’t say anything for a moment. Instead he gazed at the three of them, giving them all the same scrutiny.

“The Joker has threatened my family,” he finally said. “I need you to help me protect them.”

Jason laughed.

“What’s in it for us?” Jason asked him.

“The Sirens,” Batman said. “I am going to help you find them.”

Suddenly Batman reached behind his back.

Dick, Tim, and Jason immediately got into fighting stances, but before they could react, Batman tossed something on the ground. It was a black cloth sack.

Dick, Tim, and Jason stared at it warily for a moment, none of them willing to get any closer to it or to Batman.

But Batman was a patient guy, apparently. He just waited, until finally Dick took a tentative step toward the bag and snatched it off the ground.

It was heavier than he was expecting, and there were multiple things inside. They rattled as he pulled the drawstring open, then he reached in and grabbed something hard.

Dick pulled one of the objects out of the sack and stared at it. It was a black domino mask, like the kinds the Batgirls wore.

“You expect us to wear these?” Dick said, and laughed. “You’re joking.”

“I don’t joke. Put them on. I have assignments for the three of you and we’re wasting time,” Batman said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So if you are reading my other story, Qualified, I am sorry to say that there probably won't be an update this Wednesday. Things got crazy at work last week and I ended up being there way more than I was expecting. I'm so sorry about that and also sorry that I've been so bad about responding to comments lately T_T


	18. Chapter Eighteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tim stepped out of the exam room and presented himself for Batgirl’s inspection. The two of them had been sent to the clinic run by Dr. Leslie Thompkins. Batman seemed to believe that the Joker would target it, but of course Tim hadn’t been told why Batman thought that.
> 
> The helmet obscured her expression, but she nodded and said, “Good, it fits.”

Tim stepped out of the exam room and presented himself for Batgirl’s inspection. The two of them had been sent to the clinic run by Dr. Leslie Thompkins. Batman seemed to believe that the Joker would target it, but of course Tim hadn’t been told why Batman thought that.

The helmet obscured her expression, but she nodded and said, “Good, it fits.”

Tim looked down at the Kevlar. The suit was purple, but so dark it was almost black. The material was much more flexible than it looked and covered most of his body except for his feet and face.

When he looked up, he caught his own reflection in the mirror behind the counter and sink, and his pulse raced. With the suit and matching domino mask on, he looked more like a Bat than Nightshade.

“Did Batman have this just…laying around?” Tim asked.

Batgirl shrugged and said, “I don’t know, maybe. He likes to be prepared.”

“Prepared” seemed like an understatement. The suit fit him like a second skin.

Batgirl tilted her head, nodding at the vines curling around his shoulders.

“What is that?” she asked.

“Kudzu vine,” Tim explained. “It grows very fast, but it’s an invasive species. I might need it to fight, but I have to keep an eye on it so it doesn’t spread into the city.”

Batgirl said, “Huh. Interesting.”

Tim wanted to ask more questions, but she jerked her head down the hallway and said, “Come on. There’s a couple of things I need to check.”

Tim just nodded, because Batgirl’s tone didn’t suggest she was interested in his opinion. She turned and headed down the hall, so he followed her.

There wasn’t much going on in Dr. Thompkins’ clinic in the pre-dawn hours on a Saturday morning. Some of the people who were in the hallway were obviously homeless and Tim guessed they were using the place as a warming shelter. Nurses were making their way between back and forth down the hallways, moving patients from the rooms with windows to the interior rooms without them, and trying to calm people down. A Bat and a meta wandering the hallways put people on edge, apparently.

In front of him, Batgirl said, “What about Harold?”

“What?” Tim said.

She turned and said, “Sorry, not talking to you.” Facing forward again, she went on, “No, not the name Harold. I mean like H-E-R-A-L-D. Herald. It means an omen or a sign. What?”

There was another pause, and then she sighed and said, “Fine, if you say so. What about Apollo? He was the god of prophecy and he was worshipped in Delphi.”

Tim followed Batgirl behind the front desk. The nurse sitting there didn’t try to stop them as they went into the office behind it.

Batgirl didn’t give him any orders, so he hovered uselessly behind her while she sat down at a desk with three monitors sitting on top of it. He peeked over her shoulder as she signed on and accessed the building’s security cameras. It was like she knew just how to get to them.

“Don’t you pay attention in history? Delphi was famous for the oracle of Delphi,” she said.

She turned to one of the other monitors and Tim watched her bring up the records of all the current patients. She pulled something out of a hidden catch in her gauntlet and plugged it into the USB drive. A window popped up on the monitor. At first it was black and there was a grey outline of a Bat symbol, but then the program began scrolling through all of the photos of the current patients. The scrolling stopped a couple of times, bringing up mugshots and what had to be criminal records. She was checking to see if any of the patients had ties to the Joker, he realized.

Tim turned and saw that the walls in the office were covered in framed photos and newspaper clippings. Curious, he wandered over and stopped when he saw a photograph of a familiar face. It was with an article about a donation. The headline said, _Bruce Wayne Donates $100,000 to Local Clinic_.

Behind him, he heard Batgirl say, “That’s fair. What about Augur?”

Tim gazed at the frozen face of his former neighbor, beaming as he shook Dr. Thompkins’ hand.

“ _We have eyes on Commissioner Gordon_ ,” someone said. This voice was coming from the communicator attached to his mask from Batman. “ _He’s asleep. There’s no sign of any suspicious activity around his house._ ” The voice was feminine, and she had a thick Gotham accent. Tim thought it must be Huntress, but he’d never spoken to her before, so he wasn’t sure.

“ _Good. And Jack of Clubs_?” Batman said.

“ _Present,_ ” Jason said, his tone dry.

“ _He’s still with us,_ ” the woman said again, and now Tim was certain it was Huntress. Batman had sent Jason with Huntress and some kid who called himself Falconer to keep an eye on Commission Gordon. Dick was with Batwoman and Batwing over in the Financial District.

“It’s a little long, but no, I don’t hate it,” Batgirl said. “Did you check the database to see if there was somebody already going by that codename?”

Tim moved on to look at the other photographs.

There were some other donors, but it was obvious that Bruce Wayne was the most generous. It seemed like the guy was always shelling out the cash for one thing or another: repairs to the entrance, more medical equipment, new staff members, even a new wing of the building. His smile in all of the pictures was huge and vacant, more like a robot pretending to be a person than a real human.

Tim frowned, trying to recall memories of the man who had once lived next door to him and his parents. Tim tried not to think about that part of his life very much. It was pretty much all a blur of galas and prep schools and disinterested nannies, but he thought he could recall speaking to Bruce Wayne at least once. There had been a girl with him, a little older than Tim. Something happened to her not long after they met, a freak accident. She died. She had red hair.

“Then go for it,” Batgirl said. She laughed and said, “Yes, really. It’s what B told you to do, right?”

A moment later, a tentative voice said, “ _Batman_?”

“Yes?”

“ _I picked out a codename like you told me to_ ,” the voice said. “ _I’m going with Diviner._ ”

“ _Good_ ,” Batman said. “ _Have the computer record it._ ”

“ _I will,_ ” Diviner said, and then the line went quiet again.

“See?” Batgirl said. “That wasn’t so hard.”

Tim turned and headed for the doorway.

“Hey!” Batgirl said.

Tim turned and looked at her.

“What are you doing?” she asked him.

“I’m going to look around. Familiarize myself with the building,” he said, and wagged a finger around. “Is that not a good idea?”

There was a pause while she thought it over. Finally she said, “Fine. But don’t run off.”

Tim saluted and left the office. He heard her say, “No, I was talking to Nightshade, sorry.”

He nodded at the nurse sitting behind the front desk as he passed. She eyed him warily, but said nothing as he went by her to the stairs and headed up.

It was odd to be himself—to be Nightshade—and not have to worry about being seen or caught. Tim Drake wasn’t distinctive-looking enough to draw attention when he made his way around Gotham, but Nightshade had the cops called on him every time he was accidentally spotted. It was nice to not feel hunted for a change.

It was a pity it wouldn’t last.

There wasn’t much happening on the second floor. Tim kept an eye out for redheads, and passed the occasional nurse in the hall, but everyone gave him a wide berth. Batgirl had already warned the staff not to get too close.

He went around a corner, and that was when he ran into Dr. Thompkins.

She looked up from a clipboard and inspected him.

“Nightshade,” she said. She did not smile.

She was tall and thin, silver-haired, and nothing like Ivy at all. The way that she looked right at him, bored and unamused—like he didn’t scare her and nothing he could ever do would surprise her—reminded him so much of Ivy that it stung.

“Doctor,” Tim said, nodding.

“Should I call you Nightshade?” she asked, cocking an eyebrow.

“You can call me Tim,” he said.

She tucked the clipboard back into the box next to one of the patient rooms and started to make her way around him.

“I was wondering about something?” he said.

Dr. Thompkins turned back to him, one eyebrow still raised inquisitively.

“What happened to that woman Jason and I brought here? The redhead with the scar on her face?” Tim asked, pointing at his own cheek. “I was looking around, but I haven’t seen her anywhere.”

An odd expression flickered over Dr. Thompkins’s face, so fast that Tim almost didn’t catch it.

“She’s been relocated,” Dr. Thompkins said.

“Where?”

“Are you her relative?” she asked.

Tim shook his head.

“Then it’s none of your business,” she said.

Tim didn’t really know what to say to that, so he just shrugged and said, “Alright.”

Dr. Thompkins’ eyes narrowed slightly, and she inspected him more closely. Tim didn’t know what she was looking for.

“She’s safe, if that’s what you’re wondering. It turns out that she has family in the area, and they were very happy to find her,” Dr. Thompkins said.

“Oh,” Tim said. ”Well, good to know. Jason will be happy to hear that.”

Dr. Thompkins frowned then, and looked him up and down again. But whatever was on her mind, she didn’t share it.

“I’m glad you put on that new suit,” she said, and then glanced down at his feet. “Careful where you put those.”

She went around him and headed back downstairs. Tim watched her go, and was about to follow her back down, but he stopped when Diviner spoke.

“ _Batman_ , _I think something’s wrong._ ”

“ _Where?_ ” Batman asked.

“ _Wayne Enterprises_ ,” Diviner said. “ _Somebody just hit a panic button on the third floor. The video just popped up. There’s_ — _oh God._ ”

“ _Diviner, I need you to focus. Describe what you see_ ,” Batman said.

“ _Guys in clown masks. They’re in the video, from the cameras at WE. They’re in the building. I think they shot a security guard_ ,” Diviner said.

“ _Are there other workers in the building?_ ” Batman asked.

“ _Uh, yes_ ,” Diviner said. “ _Some guys in a lab on the 27th floor. More security guards. I think—the guys in the clown masks, they must know where the employees are. They’re on the elevator._ ”

“ _Black Bat and I are going now_ ,” Batman said.

* * *

Cassandra broke in through a window on the 27th floor.

Three men in the clown masks were exactly where Cullen said they would be. They looked up at her and the shower of shattered glass. Before they could fire their weapons, she tossed a smoke bomb.

The men yelled and started shooting their rifles. Cassandra had already moved.

She took the first one out easily with the butt of his own rifle. He crumpled to the ground, unconscious.

She kicked the second man’s kneecap, breaking it. He dropped his gun, and she kicked it away. It slid down the tile, away from his reach.

The last clown man fired at the source of all the commotion, almost hitting one of his own partners. Cassandra jumped on top of a desk and came down at him from above. She wrapped an arm around his neck and squeezed, cutting off his oxygen. The man gaped like a fish and bashed her into the cubicle wall behind them, but soon the lack of oxygen made him go limp in her arms. He too slid to the ground.

“ _Oh my god,_ ” Cullen said. “ _Did you kill him?_ ”

“No,” Cassandra said. “More?”

“ _Yeah, there’s others. Two more around the corner. They’re heading your way_ ,” he said.

“Which side?” she asked.

“ _Uh—right? I mean left! Your left! They have guns_!” he said.

Cassandra stepped behind a cubicle wall before the two men ran around the corner. They ran right by her hiding place to their fallen companions.

“Shit, where did he go?” one of them asked.

Cassandra stepped out of the cubicle and snuck up behind them. She could hear Cullen’s panicked breathing, but the men didn’t even have time to process that she was behind them before she was kicking one into the other.

The man in front dropped his gun. He scrambled to get it, but Cassandra tossed one of her special shurikens at his leg, encasing it in a foam that hardened, trapping him on the ground.

The other man managed to hold on to his rifle, but he didn’t react fast enough. He was still staring at her as she slipped around him and punched him twice, first right in the center of his chest, then she grabbed his arm with one hand and punched it with the other. She heard the bones snap. The man went down screaming.

“ _Oh god oh god oh god,_ ” Cullen said.

“Next?” Cassandra said.

“ _Black Bat, I need you in here_ ,” Bruce said. “ _Lab 12-C_.”

“Diviner?” she said.

“ _Uh, go straight and take a left, second door,_ ” Cullen said.

Black Bat ran that way.

Lab 12-C had glass walls. She saw blood on the tile, and a group of men and women crouched behind a counter. Batman was fighting six more men in clown masks.

Some of the windows had already been shot out. Cassandra picked one of the gaps and ran in, throwing herself into the fight.

Only a couple of the men noticed her arrival. Her first challenger had a bad foot. He pointed a gun at her, but he had bad aim. She dodged the bullet and hit him once in the ribs, once in the shoulder, and kicked his ankle, right in the tendons were it would hurt most. He went down.

The next man watched until his companion went down. Then he charged at her, but she moved a step to the left. He ran into some machinery that was hanging down from the lab ceiling, knocking himself out.

The rest of the clown men were too distracted by Batman. She was sneaking up behind one of them when she heard Cullen’s panicked voice in her ear again.

“ _Batman!_ ” he said. “ _Something’s wrong. St—Spoiler is fighting somebody and it looks bad!_ ”

“Who?” Batman asked.

“ _I don’t remember what he’s called! He’s got a black and orange suit. His face is covered!_ ”

“Deathstroke,” Cassandra said.

“Where?” Batman asked.

“ _City Hall District, uh, Wall Street and Garbacher Avenue_ ,” Cullen said.

Cassandra looked at Batman, at the four men who were still standing, and then to the crowd of innocent scientists hiding behind the counter.

Then she looked back over to Bruce. He was looking at her.

“Go!” Bruce said. “Go now!”

Cassandra turned and ran back out of the lab.

* * *

“ _Batman!_ ” said someone else, a man this time. “ _Dick Grayson just took off!_ ”

Batgirl was leaning up against the wall with her arms crossed over her chest, and her helmet turned in Tim’s direction when this message came through.

“ _When?_ ” Batman asked.

“ _As soon as we heard about Spoiler_ ,” the man said.

“ _Can you catch him?_ ”

“ _Are you serious?_ ” the man—who Tim knew now had to be Batwing—asked.

“Where is he going?” Batgirl asked.

Tim shrugged.

“ _Batman, there are three men in the parking garage. They’ve got clown masks too,_ ” Diviner said.

“ _Any civilians?_ ”

“ _None that I can—hey!_ ”

The line went dead, and a few seconds later, another husky voice said, “ _Batman, this is Oracle_.”

“ _Oracle_ ,” Batman said. “ _How are you_?”

“ _I’ll be fine. I’m taking over the comms for now. Diviner will assist me,”_ she said.

“ _How is Spoiler?_ ” he asked.

“ _Hold on, let me catch up. It looks like Agent Erikson escaped, but Spoiler’s in bad shape. I hope Black Bat can get there_ —”

Suddenly outside there was a loud pop, and Tim missed the rest of Oracle’s sentence. Batgirl uncrossed her arms and pushed away from the wall at once, turning toward the sound. The nurse at the front desk looked up from her computer, tense.

Batgirl said, “That sounded like—”

_POP POP POP._

“Gunfire,” Tim said.

Batgirl strode toward one of the windows, saying, “Batman, we have gunfire outside the clinic!”

“ _Lock it down, Batgirl_ ,” Batman said.

She turned and yelled at the nurse behind the desk, “Panic button, now!” Then Batgirl ran toward the door and bolted it. The nurse did something behind the desk and red lights in the ceiling started flashing down the hallway.

There was more gunfire outside, closer this time. Tim backed away from the entrance instinctively, and the kudzu vine curled around his body in response to his fear. It wasn’t like he was unfamiliar with gunfire, but usually he was running away from it, not preparing to face it like Batgirl was.

“Oracle?” Batgirl said.

“ _You have five gunmen in clown masks out front, approaching from the west. There are two more gunmen approaching the back door_ ,” Oracle said.

Batgirl cursed under her breath.

Behind them, Joker’s men were shooting at the entrance.

“Nightshade,” Batgirl said, “I need you to go to the back and protect that entrance. Don’t let them get into the clinic.”

Tim nodded at her and turned at once, running to the back.

There were people crowding the hallways suddenly, shoving each other to get into exam rooms and see over each other’s heads. Panic made people stupid, Tim thought.

“Out of the way!” he yelled, but they hardly seemed to notice him. He kept yelling at them to get in the rooms and barricade the doors anyways, hoping some of them would listen.

When he got to the back entrance, he found a nurse piling stretchers in front of the door.

“Get out of here!” Tim said. “Go find somewhere to hide.”

“What about you?” she said.

As soon as the question left her mouth, there was gunfire. Tim and the nurse backed away from the door as the bullets pelted against the metal.

He could hear lots of banging and shouting coming from back down the hallway by the front entrance. People were screaming.

“I’ll be fine,” Tim said.

The nurse gave Tim one last long, doubtful look, and then she ran back into the clinic, disappearing down a bend in the hallway.

Outside there was a crunching sound, like metal twisting. Then there was a small boom, and Tim flinched.

He was still wondering what to do when the door squealed open. They’d blown out the lock. Tim looked at the two men in clown masks over the pitiful barricade of stretchers.

“The fuck?” one of them said.

“ _Batgirl, the back entrance is open! They got in!_ ” Diviner said.

“ _I’m not doing so hot up here either!_ ” Batgirl said.

The other henchman, the smaller of the two, pointed his rifle at Tim and said, “Who are you? You’re not a Bat!”

“I’m Nightshade,” Tim said.

“Get out of the way, kid,” the first henchman said. “Our boss wants the Bats.”

Tim cocked his head and stared at the man, thoughtful for a moment.

The kudzu vine curled down Tim’s arm, and Tim urged it to grow. As a long tendril snaked down to the ground, the men looked at it, then back up at Tim’s face.

“What are you doing?” one of them demanded.

The bigger man aimed his weapon, but the vine snatched out and grabbed his wrist as he pulled the trigger, pulling the barrel away so that the bullet embedded in the wall instead of Tim’s head.

“What the hell?” the man said, mask turning down to look at his captured hand.

“Grow,” Tim said, and that was all the encouragement the kudzu vine needed. The roots twisting around the first man’s wrist thickened and began to cover his whole arm. The rifle fell out of his hand when the kudzu tightened enough to break his wrist.

The second man raised his gun to shoot at Tim, but the kudzu vine was growing fast. Tim had another vine rise up behind him and slip around his neck. With a yell, the man was pulled back out of the clinic and tossed into the alleyway.

“ _Careful, Nightshade! Don’t kill them_!” Oracle yelled.

Tim was too busy to tell her that he’d never promised Batman he wouldn’t. He urged the kudzu to keep growing and growing, covering the back door, trapping the smaller henchmen outside.

Tim went over to the remaining clown before the kudzu vine swallowed him and grabbed the mask, ripping it off and tossing it away.

The man’s eyes were wide underneath it. He was ugly, pale and unshaven. His nose and skin were bumpy in a way that hinted at a lifetime of brawling.

“Where’s Ivy?” Tim asked him.

“What?” the man said.

Tim grabbed his chin and yanked his head up, almost wishing the Kevlar wasn’t there, that the man would have to feel his skin burn.

“Where is she?” he said.

“I don’t know! I don’t know, Joker doesn’t tell us shit like that!” he insisted.

Tim let go of him and let the kudzu vine take over, burying him in a coffin of vines. The man screamed, but Tim ignored it. He wouldn’t suffocate in there.

Probably.

“ _ETA Batwoman and Batwing_?” Batgirl asked.

Tim turned and headed into the hall back toward the entrance, letting the mass of growing kudzu follow him.

When he arrived at the front of the building, it was to find the front door broken open. Batgirl was fighting a huge masked man and another was unconscious on the ground. Three others were picking themselves up, obviously having already been beaten once.

“Help!” Batgirl yelled when she saw Tim.

One of the men who was getting up wasn’t far from a rifle. He lunged for it, but when he picked it up and pulled the trigger, a thick cord of a vine rose up and blocked the bullet. Tim felt the pain reverberate through him.

“Nice try,” Tim said. He thought about what he wanted the green to do and the kudzu vine obliged, snaking toward the man and wrapping up his feet. He tried to kick the vines away, but they were too fast and too strong for him, and he got pulled to hang from the ceiling, losing his grip on the rifle on his way up.

“Behind you!” Batgirl said.

Tim turned and saw that one of the other men was sneaking up behind him.

“Duck!” she yelled.

Tim threw himself to the ground and Batgirl lifted up one of her arms. Something shot out of one of her gauntlets and latched onto the man’s chest. For a second nothing happened, but then whatever it was lit up in a shower of sparks, and the man went down screaming.

_Jesus,_ Tim thought.

He got back to his feet and took out the remaining one of the masked men with the vine, pulling him into a mass of vines as he had with the man by the back door. That only left Batgirl’s gigantic opponent.

He hesitated. Controlling the green like this always made him feel lightheaded and dizzy, and this was more than he’d ever tried to push it before. He wasn’t sure how much further he could push the kudzu vine in this fight without consequences.

Batgirl shot another one of her shock devices at the huge man, but he dodged and it missed him. He was laughing in a poor imitation of the Joker as she charged at him.

Tim was so distracted by her fight that he almost missed what was happening behind him.

The one man on the ground who Tim had assumed was unconscious hadn’t really been unconscious at all. He was creeping toward the hallway.

The man reached into his jacket and pulled something blocky and mechanical. Tim saw a bunch of wires and put two and two together.

“Bomb!” he yelled, just as the man tossed the thing down the hallway.

“Get down!” Batgirl said.

Tim didn’t think. Instead he threw his arms out, willing the green to do _something_.

The vines surged into the hall like a many-tentacled monster, curling around the bomb, burying it under the cover of the green. Then the bomb went off, throwing him and Batgirl and the masked men back in a shower of debris. A pain like nothing Tim had ever experienced before ripped through him.

He lost consciousness before he even hit the ground.


	19. Chapter Nineteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Deathstroke slashed his sword at her rib cage all Stephanie could think was, Is this really happening?

There was a strange sort of unreality about it, and Stephanie couldn’t figure out why.

It wasn’t like she’d never fought a supervillain before. This wasn’t even the first time she’d fought one right before Christmas or on the roof of Gotham Public Library.

But as Deathstroke slashed his sword at her rib cage all Stephanie could think was, _Is this really happening_?

Stephanie lunged at Deathstroke with her bo staff, aiming for his head, but Deathstroke dodged and she ended up losing her footing. Someone down below screamed as she slid down the icy roof, but there was a good reason she’d kept her old Bat boots even after she quit being Batgirl. The traction on the bottom of her shoes caught and snagged in the ice, and she jerked to a stop before she reached the ledge.

“You’re fading,” Deathstroke said.

Stephanie heaved out a breath, tossing her long hair out of her face. It wasn’t that he was wrong, necessarily. He’d already cut her once, on her leg, and the wound was slowly seeping blood. He’d also hit her face, hard enough to break her nose and make it bleed all over her mouth. She felt a little dizzy, and the cold and the height sure didn’t help.

But Agent Erikson had gotten away. That was the part that mattered.

Emboldening herself, she jumped back up the icy roof, careful so as not to slip again.

He swiped at her legs again but she jumped, flipping over the blade and bringing her staff down on his shoulder. She heard the crack as it hit his armor, and he grunted out loud. Stephanie felt a vicious rush of gratification that she’d actually gotten him.

Her gratification didn’t last long. The second her feet hit the roof again, Deathstroke rolled and swept them out from under her. This time she hit a flatter section of the roof, but she lost her grip on her bo staff. She scrambled after it, but she wasn’t fast enough. She watched, wide-eyed, as it rolled down and over the edge of the roof.

Then she looked back up at Deathstroke.

He took a couple of steps toward her, the orange and black of his suit weirdly bright in the winter grey landscape of Gotham.

“No more tricks up your sleeve?” he asked.

He was, regrettably, right. She’d already used all of her smoke bombs and shurikens. Now that her bo staff was gone, she had nothing to block his sword.

There was only one card left that she hadn’t played—one last trick tucked behind her back.

She smiled up at him, showing her all of her bloody teeth.

“You lost. Every second you waste fighting me, Agent Erikson gets farther and farther away,” she told him.

“Agent Erikson was only part of the contract. I can always go back for her later,” he said, and he lifted his sword, swinging it around so that the sharp tip pressed into her neck, hard enough so she could feel it, but not enough to draw blood.

Maybe it took too long for his meaning sink in, but it finally did.

“Me?” she said.

Deathstroke nodded.

Stephanie eyed his blade again, considering it with a bit more wariness now than before.

“Who was it?” she asked.

If Deathstroke felt any sympathy for her at all, the mask hid it.

“Does it matter?” he asked.

“I’m not allowed to know who hired you to kill me?”

Deathstroke shrugged and said, “Black Mask really hates you.”

Stephanie laughed, even though nothing was particularly funny.

“No hard feelings,” Deathstroke said, and he drew the sword back, preparing to hit her with a coup de grâce.

Stephanie reached behind her back and pulled Agent Erickson’s handgun out of where it was tucked into the back of her pants. She pointed it at Deathstroke’s face.

This made him pause. Nobody ever expected a Bat to have a gun.

“Do you even know how to use that, kid?” he asked.

Stephanie turned the safety off.

“How do you know it will get through my mask?” he asked.

“I don’t,” she said.

But Deathstroke hadn’t moved since she pulled it out, and that seemed like a pretty good sign. Maybe she wouldn’t be able to kill him—but it definitely wouldn’t do nothing.

The moment stretched on, neither of them making their move.

“Interesting,” Deathstroke said, cocking his head. “But will she do it?”

The memory came back to Stephanie, unsettling and unwanted, though that night couldn’t have been more different than her current predicament.

“ _Come on, Stephanie. Put the gun down. Everybody knows Batman doesn’t kill. That’s my little girl._ ”

Her muscles were sore and the gun was heavy, but Stephanie didn’t lower her arm.

Deathstroke was a bad person, there was no doubt about that. He killed people, people who were just trying to make the world a better place. The world would be better off without him.

Time seemed to blur. The memories flashed through her head, branded in her brain forever. The way her father’s mouth had opened with shock while dark blood soaked his chest. The way he’d collapsed on her, a horrible parody of a final embrace between a father and daughter. She’d watched his eyes the moment it happened, saw the life leave him.

And ever since she’d drifted, living half a life, like something vital inside of her had died along with her dad. She could kill again. What difference would it make to her? It wasn’t like she wasn’t already a murderer.

Then a different memory flashed in her mind. Her and Cass, huddled up on the roof of a halfway house one freezing night, whispering secrets in the dark. Cass had admitted that she was a murderer too, that she’d killed a man once and would never do it again. Stephanie asked her how she was so sure.

“ _My father...taught me to kill. I choose to be better_. _I choose to be more...than a killer_ ,” Cass had replied. Then she’d looked over at Stephanie for a long time, and Stephanie had thought that she wished Cass wasn't wearing her domino mask, so she could see her eyes. Cass had beautiful eyes.

Stephanie dropped the gun.

“Hmm. I’m almost disappointed,” Deathstroke said.

She closed her eyes and put her head down on the library’s roof. She felt the pressure of the blade pressing into her suit above her heart, but she thought, _I won’t scream. I won’t beg._

Then there was a loud crack and Stephanie’s eyes snapped open.

“Slade, don’t!”  a voice yelled.

A whip was coiled around Deathstroke’s hand, the one holding the sword.

“Grayson,” Deathstroke said. “What do you want?”

“Let her go!” Stray said. Instead of his usual shiny leather suit, he was wearing a sturdier-looking matte black suit, complete with Bat boots and a domino mask. Only the cat ears poking out of his black hair looked to be his.

Stray looked down at Stephanie and said, “You! What are you doing? Get up!”

Stephanie just gazed at him, perplexed by the morning’s turn of events.

“You can’t beat me, Grayson,” Slade said, sounding amused. “You’ve tried before. You did not succeed.”

Suddenly, Stray’s eyes darted to something behind her and Deathstroke. Then he looked back over at Deathstroke and smiled.

“You’re right. I can’t,” he said. He tipped his head and said, “But I think she can.”

Stephanie and Deathstroke both turned their heads and looked across the street.

Black Bat was standing on top of a gargoyle on the building across the street. Her black hair and cape snapped in the wind.

Stephanie felt a spike of pure joy go through her. _Cass_.

Black Bat swung across the street and kicked Deathstroke’s arm, so hard that the blow knocked his sword right out of his hand. The blade nicked Stephanie and she grunted, but then the blade was skittering away across the roof. Cass landed and immediately flipped, lunging for Deathstroke again. Stephanie laughed, loud and delighted, when Cass jumped and kicked Deathstroke square in the chest, knocking him back.

Cass attacked again and again, so fast until she’d pushed Deathstroke down the length of the building, right to the edge of the library’s roof. Then she kicked him off the ledge, and Deathstroke fell to the roof of the building down below.

Stephanie had just watched Cass jump off the ledge after him when she realized Stray was at her side, but she was having trouble focusing on him. Prickles of light were sparkling in her eyes and her limbs felt numb, and Stephanie knew from experience that this meant there was a good chance she was going to pass out.

“Are you hurt?” he said.

Stephanie nodded.

“Where?” he said.

“Just my leg,” Stephanie said. “I think my collarbone might be broken too. I don’t know.”

Stray put pressure on her bleeding leg and turned to look back down on her face, his eyes hidden by his black domino mask.

“What’s wrong with you? Why were you just laying there letting him kill you?” Stray asked.

Stephanie didn’t have the energy to tell him. Just staying awake was hard enough.

“I’ve got her,” Stray said suddenly. “Black Bat’s fighting Deathstroke. I think—”

Stephanie wasn’t sure he finished the sentence. Everything sounded far away. The last thing Stephanie saw before she passed out was the dark shape of Cass striding toward her.

* * *

Huntress had been keeping an eye on him ever since the shooting started at the clinic.

“Stay where I can see you,” she snapped when he got up to walk down the length of the roof. They were still watching over Commissioner Gordon’s house, because naturally Batman would send Jason to watch out for a cop.   

“I’m not going anywhere,” he snarled.

Falconer was crouched between Jason and his mentor on the roof, and he shot an uneasy look between them.

“I understand that your brother is in trouble, but Batwing and Batwoman are much closer to his location and can assist him and Batgirl just as well—or better—than you can,” Huntress said.

Jason gazed over at her. He’d never fought Huntress before, but something gave him the impression that it would be a good time. And he really wanted to fight.

He could tell by the way her lip curled that she was thinking about the exact same thing. It would feel really good to fight somebody, especially somebody who knew what they were doing.

He didn’t fight her. Instead he traveled down the length of the roof, trying not to look like he was fidgeting. The new suit was nice, and somehow a lot lighter and warmer than his old suit, but it was still an adjustment. It had white spiked gauntlets, and he kept accidentally pricking himself with them when he crossed his arms over his chest. The new mask was odd too, but he liked it, as much as he didn’t want to admit it. Instead of the old plastic mask he’d been wearing for years, this one was metal and protected his forehead as well as the lower half of his face.

At least it still had his Jack of Clubs symbol across the chest. That much was the same.

“ _Batman!_ ” said a voice, a young one. It was the kid who was calling himself Diviner.

“ _What is it, Diviner_?” Batman asked.

“ _Black Bat and Stray rescued Spoiler, but Spoiler passed out._ ”

“ _Spoiler needs...medical attention_ ,” came the distinct voice of Black Bat. “ _Bleeding_.”

“ _Bring her back to the cave_ ,” Batman said.

Falconer looked up at Huntress and mouthed, _Cave?_

Huntress shrugged. Jason thought it was a little comforting to know that he wasn’t the only one who had no idea what was going on.

“ _And Deathstroke_?”

“ _Incapacitated_ ,” Black Bat said.

“ _Good. Stray, can you hand him over to the GCPD_?”

Jason snorted, but he heard Dick say, “ _I suppose_.”

“ _Batman, we’ve reached the clinic, but it’s not good_ ,” Batwing said.

Jason’s tensed. Huntress and Falconer looked over at him.

“ _A bomb went off, but it looks like Nightshade managed to control the blast_ ,” Batwoman said. “ _He’s unconscious too._ ”

“ _Batgirl_?” Batman said.

“ _I’ll be fine_ ,” she said, but her voice sounded tremulous even to Jason’s ears.

“Is Tim hurt?” Jason asked.

“ _He’s not bleeding, he’s_ — _it looks like he’s just knocked out_ ,” Batwing said.

“He feels what the green feels. If anything green got destroyed he would’ve felt it,” Jason said.

“ _Batwoman, you know what to do_ ,” Batman said.

Jason was about to ask what the fuck that meant, but Falconer suddenly tapped Huntress’s leg and pointed at somebody down on the street.

There was a man heading up the block. His hands were tucked into the pockets of his brown jacket, and his head was ducked down against the cold. There wasn’t anything about him in particular that gave off suspicious vibes, but anybody crazy enough to be out during a fucking blizzard early on a Saturday morning was suspicious enough.

They watched him walk past Commissioner Gordon’s house, and then he turned down the alleyway that cut behind Gordon’s townhome, disappearing from view.

Falconer stood up.

“You,” Huntress said, pointing at Jason, “approach from the southeast. Stay out of sight. I’ll come in from the north. Falconer, come at him from the west.”

Huntress turned and headed across the roof without further comment. Falconer and Jason exchanged a glance, and then they both got up and went where Huntress told them to go.

Jason approached the townhouse from the ground, because he _wasn’t_ a Bat and felt better with both of his feet on solid earth. Batman could give him a fancy new suit and a bunch of gadgets, but he couldn’t change that. 

And anyway, Huntress told him to approach Commissioner Gordon’s place from the southeast, and the easiest way to do that was to walk across the street, not jump across rooftops like some idiot with a death wish.

Jason followed the guy down the alleyway, not missing the way that the guy was swaying a little bit. Then he abruptly stopped next to a dumpster and half turned around, so Jason slipped into a shadowed doorway. The guy walked over to the wall and Jason heard something that sounded suspiciously like a zipper being pulled down.

The guy pissed right there next to the trash.

_Gotham_ , Jason thought.

The guy zipped his pants back up when he was done and carried on down the street.

Jason followed him a little bit farther, but now Jason was sure the guy was drunk.

“ _Jack of Clubs, what happened down there_?” Huntress said.

“Nothing,” Jason said. “Drunk guy pissing in an alley.”

Huntress sighed. “ _Return to the roof._ ”

“Right away, boss,” Jason said, in his most sarcastic voice.

Huntress didn’t say anything, but Jason could feel the hostility radiating down at him from above.

He was almost out of the alleyway when he felt his phone vibrating in the pocket of his pants.

Jason pulled his phone out and looked down at the caller ID, but it just said _Unknown Caller_. All at once, the blood in Jason’s body turned cold. An instant later it was hot—boiling, burning hot.

Jason accepted the call and put the phone to his ear.

“Hello?” he said.

“ _Is this little Jester?_ ”

For a moment, Jason couldn’t respond. His mouth was dry, parched.

Finally, he managed to ask, “What did you do to Harley?”

“ _Do to her? Why, nothing! I would never hurt my lady love_ ,” the Joker said.

“You’re lying. You’re doing something to keep her with you and I’m going to kill you,” Jason snarled.

“ _Oh, Little Jay_ ,” Joker crooned. “ _Would you like to see her again_?”

Jason wanted to see her so bad he felt physically sick.

“ _Ditch the mask and come to the place where I plucked you off the streets so many years ago_ ,” the Joker said. “ _Bring a Bat with you, and...well. I suppose I don’t need to say what will happen, do I my boy?_ ”

“I’m not your boy,” Jason said.

“ _You know, we are going to need to have a heart-to-heart family discussion about your manners, sonny_ ,” the Joker said and laughed, so loud that Jason flinched and pulled the phone away from his ear. He was still staring down at the screen when the Joker ended the call.

* * *

Tim could hear the horns of a train, but the sound was distant, as if it was coming from somewhere far away. A dog barked, and he saw a flash of something in his mind. A sign through a window with an illustration of an Apple painted on it. There was an old grandfather clock, still ticking. Light reflected on green glass.

With a gasp Tim’s eyes flew open, and the sounds of the train and the ticking and the barking dog disappeared. For a moment there was just a whining noise in his ears, before the sounds unscrambled themselves into frantic, disembodied chatter.

Tim was laying on a stiff cot under a bright light. As his eyes adjusted to the oddness of this, other details slowly came into focus.

“—it would take me at least thirty minutes to get over to that part of the city, and Nightshade is still unconscious. I don't want to leave without assessing his condition first.”

“ _I’ll put Black Bat on his trail as soon as she’s brought Spoiler back to the cave_.”

Tim sat up and looked around, squinting in the darkness.

The last thing he could remember was being in the clinic. He’d been fighting somebody. Guys in clown masks. There was an explosion. His kudzu vine was destroyed.

Now he was in some dark space. The walls and floors were concrete, and there were shelves lining the far wall, stacked with equipment. A blue motorcycle was parked near him.

When he looked over his shoulder, he saw Batgirl sitting in front of a huge computer monitor. The brightness of the screen was the only source of light, and Tim saw that her helmet was off. She had choppy purple hair, a little faded, and her roots were a chestnut brown color.

“Where am I?” Tim said.

Batgirl half turned at the sound of his voice, but seemed to change her mind before he saw her face. She reached for her helmet instead, slipping it over her head before she got up from the computer and came over to him.

“How do you feel?” she asked.

_Terrible_ , Tim thought. A headache was pounding in his temple, his whole body was sore and his hands were shaking. But considering he’d made it through a bomb, he seemed to be in ok shape.

“I’ll be fine,” Tim said. “What is this place? Is this Batman’s hideout?”

Batgirl shook her head.

“Not even close,” she said.

But it _was_ theirs, some kind of Bat bunker. Tim reached for the green through the layers of concrete and saw flashes of what was above and around them. The hideout was underground, hidden beneath an old courtyard. They were still in Crime Alley, he was pretty sure about that.

“What about the clinic? What happened to it?” he asked.

“There were no casualties, thanks to you,” she said. “The building is in bad shape. Batwoman and Batwing are there now, helping evacuate.”

Tim nodded.

Batgirl put her hands on her hips, but didn’t say anything. He couldn’t see her face, but he could tell she was staring at him.

“What?” Tim said.

“Look—” she started, but then she stopped.

Tim cocked his head at her and said, again, “What?”

“It’s about your brother,” Harper said.

Tim felt a cold trickle of panic go through him and he asked, “Jason? What happened?”

“He’s fine, or at least he was fine the last time anybody saw him. But he kind of took off,” she said.

Tim got to his feet and said, “When?”

“About ten minutes ago. He got a call from somebody and we’re pretty sure it was the Joker. Then he took his mask off and disappeared. Do you have any idea where he could have gone?”

Tim shook his head.

“I hate to have to ask this, but is there any chance he could be working with the Joker?” she asked.

Tim shook his head vehemently.

“Jason hates him. He’s always hated him. He would only go if he had a good reason. The Joker must’ve threatened him or something,” Tim said.

Batgirl sighed and returned to the computer. Tim followed her, but all she did was lock it, leaving the dark symbol of the Bat on the screen.

“What do we do now?” he asked.

“I am going to help Black Bat look for Jack of Clubs,” Batgirl said, and headed around him to her bike.

“And me? What about me?” Tim asked.

“You are going to stay here and recuperate,” Batgirl said.

“But I’m fine,” he said.

“You’re not fine,” she said. “I can see your hands shaking. You should stay here until you’ve recovered.”

“I want to look for Jason,” Tim said.

She reached out to put a hand on his shoulder. Tim recoiled before he remembered the new suit, not to mention the fact that Batgirl was covered in her own protective layers of Kevlar and metal.

She recovered well from the brush off.

“Stay here, Nightshade,” she said. “You’ll be safe here, and you can rest. I’ll come back to get you in a couple of hours.”

“A couple of hours?” Tim said disbelievingly, but Batgirl was using her do-as-I-say voice again, the one that did not encourage argument.

Without another glance back at him, she headed for her bike and climbed on the back.

“Batgirl!” he said.

“Open door,” she said, and something controlling the bunker complied. An opening in the wall rumbled open and Batgirl drove through it into a tunnel.

The opening shut before Tim had the chance to slip out after her.

* * *

As Jason made his way back to the warehouse where he first met the Joker eight years ago, he recited poetry to himself.

“ _Be to her, Persephone, all the things I could not be_ ,” he murmured under his breath, so softly that the sound would get lost in the sounds of Gotham. “ _Take her head upon your knee. She that was so proud and wild._ ”

A man passing Jason on the street gave him a wary look and moved out of the way.

“ _Flippant, arrogant and free. She that had no need of me is a little lonely child lost in hell._ ”

Jason passed walked into the alleyway between an old pharmacy and a pawn shop. All that was left of an old gate was the rounded bit that curved between the two buildings. It had probably been there for a hundred years. There was a metal gargoyle that dipped down from it, not quite low enough to touch. _Here there be monsters,_ Jason thought.

Jason went down the alleyway, past all the wrong doors until he finally reached the right one. It looked harmless enough. Metal and rusty and not even covered in graffiti.

“ _Persephone, take her head upon your knee._ ”

Jason put his hand on the handle and pulled up as he shoved it open. It was the trick he’d figured out back when he was squatting in the place.

The door squealed open and Jason stepped in.

“Where are you, asshole? Where’s Harley?” he asked.

There was no response.

Goosebumps prickled on his arms.

The warehouse looked just like he remembered. It was crazy how it had just been sitting there all that time, gathering dust. Had it been in any other part of the city, somebody would’ve turned it into a tea bar or some hipster offices already.

But this was Crime Alley. Everybody left Crime Alley to rot, to die. The last line of the poem came to his mind, unbidden, though he did not speak it out loud.

_Say to her, ‘My dear, my dear, it is not so dreadful here.’_

He didn’t notice the guy sneaking up on him until it was too late.

* * *

Sometimes people made the mistake of thinking that just because Tim was a plant metahuman like Ivy, that meant he didn’t know anything about anything other than plants.

This was not true.

He’d been a computer science student before the accident, and was still pretty good with electronics, even after not doing much with them for a couple of years.

What was Batman’s bunker but a big computer? A complicated one to be sure, but still a computer.

And he had a brother that needed him.

That was how he found himself pulling apart all of the wiring inside one of the control panels, trying to reroute the power to the hidden doorway. He knew the thing responded to voice commands, but his voice was, of course, not one that it had been programmed to respond to. He thought maybe there could be a way to get around that.

His mind drifted, lulled into an odd sort of meditation as he worked.

Light shining on glass. A tire swing drifting in a gentle breeze. Layers of untouched snow under a tree. These images flashed through his mind, almost like a memory, but he’d never seen the place before. 

It was probably because he was still drained from fighting with the kudzu vine, but it took him a while to realize that these images weren’t just figments from a dream.

The green was trying to communicate with him.

He closed his eyes and focused on one of the flashes of images. The sign with the apple. There was a house. An old farmhouse, by the look of it. He wasn’t sure where.

Tim set the wires down on the concrete floor and focused for a minute.

The image got clearer. He saw a long winding road, and in the distance, the spire of a church rising over the brown leafless branches of the trees surrounding the house.

_What are you trying to show me?_ Tim wondered.

In the corner of the bunker, the green called to him. Tim walked over to that side of the space. When he reached it, he had to shove a shelving unit out of the way.

The shelving unit had been concealing a crack in the foundation.

Tim crouched down and called to the green, and slowly, the roots of a tree somewhere nearby broke through. Tim let the roots grow and encouraged them to curl around his feet.

As the tree made contact, slowly he could hear it. Gotham. Tim shut his eyes again and listened.

“— _heard what happened down at that clinic—I knew Joker wasn’t dead, what did I tell you?—should’ve moved out of this city when I had the chance—nothing says Christmas like watching a Batgirl punch a supervillain on the roof of the public library—Batman will stop him, he always finds a way to stop him_ —”

Tim pushed the green further. Voices clamored, shouting in his ears.

“— _good time to visit my grandparents in Metropolis—well at least the chaos seems to be contained over in the Bowery—staying off the island until the GCPD clears up this mess—next time I’m just going to let her starve. Bitch almost gutted me._ ”

_There._

He could see flashes of a place again. Green glasses lined up on a shelf. The sun shining through a window onto an old floral couch. A sign through the window said Anderson Apple Orchard. A houseplant, dying but not yet dead, was showing him these things.

Tim’s eyes opened.

“Batman?” Tim said.

“ _What is it, Nightshade?_ ” Batman asked.

“I know where Joker is keeping Catwoman,” Tim said.  

* * *

When Jason came to again, he was no longer in the warehouse.

His eyelids were sticky with something he feared was probably blood. When he finally managed to get his eyes open he nearly jumped out of his skin. Two wide glassy eyes were staring right at him.

It wasn’t real. They were doll eyes, but still he sat there, heart racing and furious. He’d been tied up in a chair and left in a child’s bedroom, but the place was decorated like a scene from a Shirley Jackson novel. Sparse furniture was overcrowded with old, dusty toys—piles of old trains, chipped and cloudy marbles, battered stuffed animals with matted fur. The doll in front of him was an antique clown doll. The paint was chipping off its metal face.

It looked exactly like his old bedroom, the one Joker had given him after he was abducted.

Overheard, static crackled and Jason winced when a speaker whined with feedback.

“ _He’s awake!_ ”

The Joker laughed, so loud that was impossible to hear anything else. The sound made Jason’s skin crawl.

As soon as the laughing stopped, Jason snapped, “Where am I? Where’s Harley?”

There was a pause, and then the Joker tittered again.

“ _You were never a very good son_ ,” he said.

Jason strained against the ropes binding him to the chair and yelled, “You were never my fucking dad!”

“ _So unfunny_ ,” the Joker said, sighing like it was a shame. “ _You never understood any of my jokes. I only ever wanted to make you and Harley laugh!_ ”

Jason gritted his teeth. As much as he wanted to argue with him, there was no point. The guy believed he was doing some kind of public service for the people, turning their lives and deaths into a punchline.

There was no point. Jason had forgotten how powerless he felt in the Joker’s presence. He hated it.

“ _That’s why I’ve decided to leave you in time out_ ,” the Joker said. “ _You’re grounded until you can be a good son. A little under nine hours now. Maybe it’ll turn out you still have potential._ ”

Jason felt a cold rush of panic go through him.

“Nine hours and you’ll do what?” he said.

“ _You’ll see, my lad! One last joke between me and my naughty boy, unless you decide to taking things less seriously_ ,” he said.

“She won’t love you if you kill me,” Jason said.

“ _My sweetheart_?” the Joker said. “ _Unlike you, she appreciates a good joke._ ”

“Not this one. Never this one,” Jason told him.

“ _Nonsense. Harley and I are birds of a feather! Two peas in a pod_ ,” the Joker said. “ _You were the one who was always ruining the fun. Always the odd boy out!_ ”

Then the Joker laughed, so loud for so long that Jason had to shut his eyes and breathe through the panic creeping in.

It was only when the intercom suddenly cut out and Jason was left in the absolute silence that he heard the ticking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter is days late T_T I realized pretty late Sunday night that ch. 19 was not at all where I wanted it to be quality-wise, and then I had to go out of town most of the week for work. I think I will be off my usual Monday posting schedule now, but there are only two chapters left so I wouldn't worry about me not posting them soon. Thanks for sticking with me this far! 
> 
> Jason's poem that he recites in this chapter is Prayer to Persephone by Edna St. Vincent Millay just in case you were wondering. 
> 
> Thanks Rainicorn2015 for helping me so much with this chapter (not to mention all of the other chapters).


	20. Chapter Twenty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It occurred to Harper that there was something different about Batman as they were sneaking up on Anderson Apple Orchard. Bruce was quieter, more intense even than usual. It was even putting her on edge, and she almost felt bad for Joker’s henchmen. Almost.

**06:04:31**

It occurred to Harper that there was something different about Batman as they were sneaking up on Anderson Apple Orchard. Bruce was quieter, more intense even than usual. It was even putting her on edge, and she almost felt bad for Joker’s henchmen. Almost.

“Oracle, do you have eyes inside?” he whispered gruffly.

“ _No devices or cameras that I can detect. Smart_ ,” Barbara said.

“So we have no idea how many henchmen are in there,” Harper said, eyeing the farmhouse warily.

“ _Not so fast_ ,” Barbara chided. “ _The drones have recorded three guys upstairs, and at least five downstairs. I was able to locate an old listing from when the orchard was for sale six years ago, and the house has a basement. My bet is that’s where they’re keeping Selina Kyle._ ”

Batman grunted in a way that communicated his approval, and then he said, “Which way should we go in?”

“ _Batgirl through the second floor, balcony on the east side of the house. B, you should sneak in through the dining room window on the north side. That side of the house gets lots of shade and there’s nobody in that room currently._ ”

“Understood,” Batman said, and then he looked to Harper and said, “Be discreet. I would like to sneak up on whoever has Selina.”

Batgirl nodded and turned to go at once, slipping across the yard to the east side of the house that Barbara indicated. There was a porch, so she didn’t even have to use any of her gadgets to hoist herself up to the second level. She stepped carefully across the wooden beams to the balcony door, peeking inside the window to see if she could see any of Joker’s henchmen or any traps around the window. But there were no traps, and no one was hanging out in the room. It looked like an old bedroom, dusty and piled with abandoned belongings.

Harper opened the door, slowly so as not to make sound, and snuck into the room. Every sense was sharpened, alert for movement in the house, but she felt steady in a way that she hadn’t felt for days, ever since Damian was abducted.

She found the first henchmen in the next bedroom. He had headphones on and she shot him with a tranq dart. He collapsed, but she was able to catch him before his body hit the floor. Setting him gently down, she moved on back into the hallway.

Something was already happening downstairs. There were thuds and muffled shouts, and the noise drew another masked henchmen out of a bathroom. He looked over the railing, not even noticing Harper in her blue and purple behind him. He got a tranq dart too, but slumped forward instead of backwards, leaning over the stairwell. Harper had to lunge and pull him back so he wouldn’t fall down to the first floor, but he was a lot bigger than the first guy and his landing wasn’t as quiet.

All the commotion drew a third man out of a tiny bathroom. He had his clown mask pulled down hanging around his neck, and yelled something incoherent at her. He threw himself at her but she ducked. She came up behind him and grabbed his arm. She shoved him up against the wall and twisted the arm behind his back until it dislocated. He went down, screaming in pain and cursing at her.

“ _Batgirl_ ,” Batman said.

“Yes?”

“ _Get down here. We’re compromised_ ,” he said.

“Yeah, I know,” she muttered, but she grabbed the railing and jumped down to the second floor, surprising one of the men who was fighting Batman.

He was also maskless, pasty white with a greying blond beard, and he smirked at her when she straightened, showing off all of his yellow teeth. It was a look that was too sure of itself, comfortable in the belief that he would be victorious. Harper shot him with one of her taser darts and he went down howling, pissing himself as he collapsed on the patchy hallway rug.

Harper carefully stepped over him and helped Bruce disarm the two men who were still up and fighting.

“Basement?” she said.

Bruce jerked his head at a narrow door under the stairs.

There was nothing left to do but approach it. Harper followed behind him, watching as he turned the knob and pushed open the door.

“Don’t follow until I give the word,” he said, and then he threw himself into the dark cellar.

For a breathless moment there were gunshots and grunts of pain. Harper knew she was supposed to wait for him to give the signal, but she’d never been very good at waiting, so she steeled herself and jumped into the dark.

Her night vision snapped on automatically, and then she saw them. There was a man peeking out from behind an old sofa, another on the ground, and one other with a gun pointed to Selina Kyle’s head. There was a gag in her mouth, and her ankles and wrists bound by a chain that was connected to the wall.

The man behind the couch was not unarmed. He lurched up and fired, and the bullet grazed her helmet, close enough that her head jerked back. She heard the sharp intake of someone’s breath through her comm, and Batman yelled, “Are you alright?”

“Fine,” she said, and ran and jumped over the couch, falling on the man in a deadweight. The darkness worked to her advantage, and that odd calm was back as she knocked the gun out of his hand. His expression was terrified, but Harper felt no remorse at all about shooting a tranq dart in the fleshy part of his chest that was revealed by the loose collar of his shirt.

Once he’d passed out, Batgirl stood and turned. The final man, the one holding the gun to Selina’s head, yelled, “Stop!” He seemed to be very focused on the Batman in front of him, and the gun was wavering, like maybe it was pointing at the wrong person.

Using the distraction to her advantage, Selina jerked her shoulder up and smashed it into his chin. He gasped in pain and dropped the handgun, and then in one smooth movement, somehow Catwoman’s legs were wrapped around the man’s neck. His mouth was bleeding as he scratched helplessly at her leg’s with his hands, but she didn’t let up, and Harper could see the pure malice on her face. She was going to kill him.

“Selina, enough. Batgirl.”

Harper shot the last man with another tranq dart and he collapsed, boneless between Selina’s legs.

Immediately, Harper and Bruce went to help Selina out of the chains. Bruce pulled something out of his belt and snapped the ones binding her hands while Harper worked on cutting the ones binding Selina’s feet. It was obvious that Joker’s men hadn’t been given orders to keep her in good health. Her hair was a oily and sticking up in odd directions, and her skin was kind of grimy.

As soon as she was free, Selina pulled the gag out of her mouth and got up. She threw herself into Bruce, arms and legs wrapped around him, and kissed him so forcefully that Bruce made an aborted sound of alarm under her lips.

For a moment his hands didn’t touch Selina, but hovered in the air like he didn’t know what to do with them.

Then he melted into the kiss, crushing Selina to himself as he got lost in the embrace.

Harper knew it was wrong to stare, but she was so used to seeing Batman at home at Wayne Manor in dad mode that it was hard to think of him as a person who could be attracted to anybody. She wondered if Oracle and Diviner were watching this back in the Batcave via her camera.

She was thinking about clearing her throat when Selina finally broke the kiss. Bruce tipped his head forward a little, chasing after Selina’s lips. It was sort of funny, and also sort of horrifying. Barbara and Steph had warned her that Bruce could get like this with Selina Kyle.

Selina smiled at Bruce and said, “How’s Dick?”

“Fine,” Bruce said. He sounded a little breathless, and again Harper was half-mortified, half-amused.

“That’s good to hear,” Selina said, and she crawled out of Bruce’s arms. She shot a perfunctory look at Harper and then looked back to Bruce, jerking her head at the man she’d almost strangled as she said, “These idiots dropped enough hints. I think I know where the Joker’s holding Ivy.”

* * *

**05:13:49**

A fly was buzzing around his head, and there were people talking. In his half-awake state, his first impulse was to snap at them. Didn’t they know how early it was? His father’s wards were an inconsiderate lot.

Then he felt how his head was pounding, and how his arms were stretched behind his back.

He opened his eyes.

He was sitting in an old parlor in a chair in front of a grand fireplace. Strands of faint dusty light poured in through two narrow windows and an old lamp was on at his left, but but most of the huge room was in shadow.

“Batboy’s awake,” said a gruff voice. “Call Joker. He wanted to talk to him when he woke up.”

“Who’s there?” Damian said, but there was some scuffling in a dark corner of the room and no one answered him.

He tugged at his bindings, but his muscles were too weak to break them. The last thing Damian could remember was being dosed with some kind of tranquilizer. He’d been in a warehouse with the Joker.

Damian took in more of his new surroundings. Huge oil landscapes covered the walls. The floor underneath him was dark marble, scuffed and scratched with age. Around him there were old settees and high-backed chairs, now worn and faded. It was a bit like Wayne Manor, he realized—if Wayne Manor had been left to rot for a decade.

There was more scuffling on the other side of the room and the definite sound of shoes flapping against the marble.

“This bird is a late sleeper!” the Joker said, stepping into the room’s weak light.

He was wearing a bright purple bathrobe and matching purple slippers. Damian could tell that the striped green outfit underneath were pajamas, and there was an unlit pipe hanging out of his mouth. It was an outfit that was clearly meant to mock him, to remind Damian of his father, although of course Father didn’t smoke.

“You drugged me,” Damian said, glaring up at him.

“Indeed I did, bird breath!” The Joker pulled the pipe out of his mouth and said, “I like you, kid. You’re bloodthirsty. I think that’s marvelous! You and I could really have some fun.”

Damian gritted his teeth.

“That’s not the face of a boy who’s on board,” the Joker said.

“I’m not like you,” Damian snarled.

“Like I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted,” the Joker went on, “you and I have some things in common. You’re not a wet blanket like your dear old dad.”

“I’m not like you,” Damian repeated, revolted by the very thought.

“Au contraire, birdling,” the Joker said. “You see, I understand you, probably better than anybody. Just like you, I know how it feels to have to compete for the big bad Bat’s attention.”

Damian frowned and said, “What?”

“Two Face, Riddler, Killer Clock, _Kite Man._ ” The Joker snorted. “With them out of the way, everything will be like it should be.”

“What are you talking about?” Damian asked.

“I’m talking about getting rid of them, worm eater,” the Joker said, and gestured so sharply that the pipe flew out of his hand and collided with a lamp. The Joker laughed when the lamp tipped over and shattered on the floor, plunging the left side of the room in darkness. “And isn’t that exactly what you want too?”

“I don’t understand,” Damian said, shaking his head. “You have worked with some of the other rogues in the past.”

“Hell, I’m working with some of them right now! But facts are facts, and they’re no good,” the Joker said. “ _I_ am the Clown Prince of Crime, and my fellow rogues keep upstaging me. Taking the Bat’s attention to lesser matters.”

Damian just stared at him, perplexed by the turn of the conversation.

“Don’t tell me you don’t get it. That you haven’t thought about how much nicer it would be if all of those annoying Batgirls were out of the picture. Spoiler. Black Bat. Oracle. Batman’s family keeps growing and growing. I can only imagine how frustrating it must be, to constantly be overshadowed,” the Joker said.

Damian gazed up at him, numb with disbelief.

“I would never...I could never,” Damian said, unable to bring himself to finish the rest of the thought.

“Don’t lie to Uncle Joker,” he said.

Damian could remember a dinner, sometime not too long ago. Sitting around the table with his father, Cassandra, Harper Row and Cullen Row. Breakfasts in the kitchen with Brown and Cassandra. Cullen Row blathering on about video games. Carrie Kelly’s apparent resurrection. His father’s affections were pulled in so many different directions.

He had wished for them to go away. He’d wanted it. He’d desired to be the only one, to be his father’s favorite. All the same...

“I do not wish death on any of them,” Damian finally told the Joker.

“No? Ah, but the sentiment is the same, dearest fledgling. And these...semantics seem to be a product of only half your heritage. Wouldn’t dear grand-pappy tell you to take what is rightfully yours?”

Damian’s mouth went dry. He almost asked how the Joker knew that, but then, if he knew that Rook was really Damian Wayne, then it probably hadn’t been hard to work out who Damian’s other parent was as well.

Taking his  his stunned silence as at least partial assent, the Joker added. “Don’t worry, we’ll start with my family, not yours. Have to work up to those acrobatic flying rats.”

He walked around Damian and reappeared a moment later pushing a cart. There was an old boxy TV on top of the cart. The screen coated with a layer of thick dust.

He picked up the remote and turned the TV on. Static buzzed for a moment, and then the black and white picture slowly became clearer.

The video was showing a child’s bedroom. There was someone sitting in a chair in the middle of the room, and Damian could tell by their posture that their arms were tied behind their back.

It took him a moment to recognize the white symbol of Jack of Clubs on the person’s chest.

“Unlike your pops, I only ever had one child,” the Joker said. “But he doesn’t love me like I loved him. He never did.”

Damian stared at the screen.

“If you kill him for me, I’ll let you live,” the Joker said.

Damian’s eyes snapped up at the Joker.

“Don’t make that pouty face! You killed me, didn’t you? Haven’t you killed plenty of others?” the Joker asked.

“That was—you are—”

“Don’t say it’s different,” the Joker said. “Do you think Little Jay’s hands are clean? He’s a murderer too, just like me.”

Damian recalled what Gordon had told him about the Sirens’ sons, about Jack of Clubs and his “victims”.

“He killed pedophiles and abusers, to defend the innocent. You kill indiscriminately because you think it is amusing,” Damian said.

“You’ve never made the distinction before. Murder is murder. _However_ , unlike my son, I’ve turned over a new leaf since you almost killed me. I had an awakening, if you will. You and I could do some real good for Gotham, more than your dear old dad could ever achieve. Together we could relieve Gotham of all it’s annoying rogues,” the Joker said. “You would be my new son! The new Jester! All you have to do is get this failed model out of the way.” He jerked his hand at the screen.

“I won’t,” Damian said.

“You will,” the Joker said. “You’re a bird, not a caterpillar. You can’t crawl into a cocoon and change your shape. You’re a killer too and you always will be. It’s in your blood. The only thing you can control is what kind of killer you want to be.”

“I am not going to do your dirty work for you. If you want your son dead, kill him yourself.”

Joker pushed the power button on the TV and the screen went dark. Then Joker put a hand to his ear and said, “Do you hear that?”

The Joker was quiet then, and in the silence, Damian could hear it. Ticking. It sounded like it was coming from within the old TV.

“What is that?” Damian said.

“A choice, bird brain. Your life or Little Jay’s,” the Joker said. “He’s got a present too. You see, he’s going to go kaboom either way, if you take my meaning. Why put it off? Why prolong it?”

Damian didn’t say anything. All he could think of were weak protests, and he knew enough about Joker to know that he wouldn’t change his mind.

“Or you can do nothing. And then you’ll both die! Kabloom!” He laughed like he’d just told a wonderful joke.

The Joker straightened suddenly and clapped his hands, calling “Jeeves!”

There were footsteps behind Damian, and then somebody was behind him. Damian jerked, but when he turned and looked up he saw a thin man in a pinstripe suit wearing a clown mask. He started cutting the ropes binding Damian to the chair.

“You’re letting me go?” Damian asked.

“Not exactly. Meet the rest of the house staff,” Joker said. He put his fingers into his mouth and whistled.

Several men in clown masks stepped into the light. They were all carrying rifles.

“Your babysitters, for the time being,” the Joker said.

The Joker walked back over to the cart and picked up something that had been hidden from Damian’s view behind the TV. It was a small rectangular box, and for a moment Damian thought it was another remote.

“This is the detonator,” the Joker said, showing him the front. There was a single white button. “All you have to do is press it, and goodbye Little J! I’ll even turn the TV off, if you don’t want to watch.”

“You aren’t going to get away with this. My father will stop you,” Damian said.

The Joker ignored this and walked over to look at an old clock on the mantel. He checked the time.

“Just after 3 p.m.!” the Joker said. “You and Jester have—ouch! Just about five hours. I’d think fast, if I were you.” He giggled.

The Joker set the detonator down on the side table next to Damian and then he departed, taunting, “Make your choice, Batboy.”

* * *

**03:58:02**

Dick dealt with Slade, and then he went to meet Black Bat in Tricorner Yards on top of an old warehouse. The chipped painted words on the side of the building said it had once belonged to a company called Fenway Shipping, and the whole neighborhood reeked like sewage.

“Ivy’s going to be pissed,” Dick said, wrinkling his nose.

Black Bat didn’t say anything. She wasn’t very chatty, Dick had learned.

“You should probably let Ivy see me first. Not that you couldn’t take her, but...it just seems like it’s for the best,” Dick told her.

Black Bat studied him for a moment, and the seconds dragged on for so long that Dick thought that he was going to get the brush off again. But Black Bat finally jerked her head in a way that Dick took to mean that she understood.

Then she got up and darted over to a window that looked down through the factory’s roof into the building’s interior. Her feet made no sound across the metal sheeting and Dick suppressed a shiver. She was quieter than him, and he was pretty good at sneaking into places by necessity.

He followed her over to the window though, and together they peered inside.

Three of Two Face’s henchmen were guarding a large black shipping container.

“ _No sunlight,_ ” Oracle said. “ _That has to be where they’re keeping her._ _Move your head to the left a little. No, the other way. Not that much._ ”

Dick did as Oracle asked, and heard her gasp of recognition. There was something built on to the side of the container, a bunch of tubes and wires. It looked complicated.  

“ _Those tubes connected to the container must be circulating air in and out_ ,” Oracle said. “ _That’s the only way to beat Ivy. Keeping her in darkness, and not letting her infect the air with pheromones. She has very little access to the green out in Tricorner Yards too. Whoever did this to her did their homework._ ”

“These guys look like Two Face henchmen, not Joker’s,” Dick said.

“ _Funny, I noticed the same thing_ ,” Oracle said.

Not for the first time, Dick almost blurted out the question. Oracle sounded an awful lot like the first Batgirl, the one he’d met when he was first starting out as Stray. He’d always wondered what had happened to her.

But this wasn’t the time. Ivy was more important.

“So what’s our play?” Dick said, glancing up at Black Bat.

Black Bat straightened and, without any kind of warning, jumped onto the window. Dick gaped as she smashed through the glass and plummeted toward the ground.

Naturally, she was fine. The men down below were scrambling up as she pulled out her grappling gun and fired it at the roof. The hooked end stabbed through and she swung down, crashing into the first of the three. He went down as the others fired their rifles at her, but she was too quick for both of them. She flipped behind the metal container holding Ivy and launched herself over it at the both of them, taking them out with a series of kicks and punches that were too fast for Dick to keep up with.

Then they were all down, and he hadn’t even left the roof yet.

Dick whistled appreciatively.

He used his whip to lower himself down to the concrete floor. It wasn’t quite long enough to get him all the way down, but he was able to jump the rest of the way, tugging on the handle of the whip to get the end to release it’s hold up above.

Black Bat just looked at him, her arms loose at her side.

“Remind me not to pick a fight with you,” he told her.

She didn’t say anything, and instead nodded at the metal container.

“Right,” Dick said, and went over to it, surprised to find it unlocked.

He understood why as soon as he opened the door.

Inside the shipping container was a glass case. At first he didn’t see her, but then he noticed the dark shape on the ground.

“Ivy!” Dick said.

Dick didn’t see any way to get into the glass. But of course, there wouldn’t be a way, not if whoever had put her in there intended for her to survive.

Dick walked back out of the shipping container and looked around the warehouse. He finally spotted a crowbar on the ground, and yes—that would do. He picked it up and went back inside the container, and then he bashed the crowbar into the glass, satisfied to see it crack.

“ _Careful_ ,” Oracle said.  

Dick bashed the crowbar against the glass again, and heard an odd sucking sound. Then the glass crackled and the wall shattered, and Dick ducked as tiny shards flew at him, grateful for the new suit.

“Ivy, are you alright?” he said.

She wasn’t moving.

It was still pretty dark in the shipping container, even with the door open. There wasn’t much sunlight on that dreary December day either, but Dick still went over to her and picked her up, carrying her over the broken glass and into the weak light streaming in through the broken window above.

He set her down under it, in the spot that was getting the most light, and crouched next to her.

“ _Is she breathing_?” Oracle asked.

Ivy’s chest was moving up and down, but barely.

“Water,” Dick said to Black Bat, who was hovering nearby.

Black Bat nodded and got up, disappearing into the dark warehouse without a sound.

“Come on, Ivy,” Dick said, and patted her face. He thought this was probably not a very good idea, but he wasn’t sure what else to do. He just had to hope Ivy hesitated before ripping him open with some kind mutant plant. But Ivy didn’t wake up.

Black Bat returned a few minutes later with a chipped Gotham Knights mug full of water.

“Sink still works,” Black Bat explained.

Dick took the water from her and tipped the cup up to Ivy’s lips, letting just a little bit of the water drip into her mouth.

For a moment there was no reaction, and then Ivy’s eyes shot open. Dick flinched when she tensed and grabbed the mug out of his hands. Then she tipped the rest of the water into her mouth, gulping it down in messy slurps.

Through his comm, he heard Oracle’s sigh of relief.

“More,” Ivy said, pushing the mug at him.

Dick handed the mug back to Black Bat, who obligingly left to go get more water.

“Where’s Tim?” Ivy said.

“He’s fine, safe. Batman has him hidden in some bunker over in Crime Alley,” Dick said.

Ivy frowned up at him, but Black Bat was back already. Ivy seemed to register her presence for the first time as Black Bat handed over the mug of water to Dick.

“There’s...well,” Dick said, shrugging. “A lot’s happened.”

Ivy took the mug of water and drank a sip.

Then her fist was tugging on the collar of Dick’s suit, and she said, “Harley.”

“We haven’t found her. The Joker still has her and Jason,” Dick said.

“ _About that,_ ” Batman said. “ _I need every member of the team who’s still able to fight to meet me at the Knights Stadium in Otisburg._ ”

Dick frowned and said, “What for?”

“ _Batgirl and I are following Jason’s trail. I believe there may be a fight, and I need you all with me,_ ” Batman said.

“You found him? How?” Dick said.

Batman didn’t answer the question, and instead said, “ _Thirty minutes. Don’t be late._ ”

Dick looked up at Black Bat, perplexed. She shrugged at him and said, “Trackers. In the suits.”

Dick looked down at his new suit, feeling a touch of betrayal. It occurred to him that he should’ve assumed, of course. It was stupid not to. But still.

“Necessary...precaution,” Black Bat said. “You could run. Or get captured.”

Considering the circumstances, Dick really didn’t think he had the right to be mad about it.

Ivy tugged on the collar of Dick’s suit again and he glanced down at her.

“What’s happening?” she asked.

“Batman thinks he knows how to find Jason,” Dick said. Then he looked back up at Black Bat and said, “And we’re going with him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am a genius and spilled coffee all over my laptop this week x_x it is still working somehow...miraculously, but if it suddenly decides not to work it could complicate matters. 
> 
> I also realized right as I was getting to the final scene that I needed another chapter, so this story will have two more chapters, not one more. Thanks for sticking with me this far :) 
> 
> Rainicorn2015 and NobodyisHome are my beta readers.


	21. Chapter Twenty-One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I hate to interrupt this touching reunion,” Batman said dryly, and Dick looked up to see him watching them impassively, “but I would like to go rescue Jack of Clubs soon, and we have tactics to discuss before we leave.”

**02:51:29**

Dick was expecting Batman and Batgirl to already be at the Gotham Knights Stadium waiting for them, but instead there was one lone thin figure standing in the middle of the field. For a moment Dick didn’t recognize him in the dark purple suit, but there was no mistaking that head of unruly black hair.

“Tim?” Dick said.

Tim turned around and looked between Dick, then Black Bat, and then finally his eyes settled on Ivy behind them.

“Tim!” Ivy said.

“Ivy!”

Ivy pushed Dick out of the way, and he watched as she and Tim ran across the field to each other and threw themselves into each other’s arms.

Black Bat stopped walking, so Dick did too, and he realized that she was letting them have their moment. For a while they stood there together, watching Tim and Ivy talk, but not being able to hear what they were saying to each other. Dick glanced back at Black Bat, and saw that she was smiling. It occurred to him that he was smiling too.

“You found them,” someone said.

Dick flinched. He wasn’t loving how many people seemed to have the ability to sneak up on him. He turned around and saw Batman, Batgirl, and Catwoman.

“Selina!” Dick’s face lit up as he reached out and squeezed her tight. Selina hugged him back, digging her long nails into the back of his suit. She was always doing that, but for the first time he didn’t care. He was just happy to see her, happy and healthy and alive.

“You stink,” he said, muffled into her shoulder.

“You’re the one who hugged me, so deal with it,” she said.

“I hate to interrupt this touching reunion,” Batman said dryly, and Dick looked up to see him watching them impassively, “but I would like to go rescue Jack of Clubs soon, and we have tactics to discuss before we leave.”

Dick let her go, and Selina slid her arm around Dick’s waist. She smirked up at Batman and said, “Killjoy.”

Batman’s grumpy expression didn’t change.

Tim and Ivy came to join the rest of them, and Dick looked over at them in time to see Ivy nod at Batman. It seemed to be her way of expressing her thanks for everything Batman had done, and wouldn’t have been much coming from anyone else, but since it was Ivy, it seemed like a magnanimous gesture.

“Orders?” Black Bat asked.

Batman pulled something small and circular out of his utility belt and pushed what Dick assumed was an invisible button before dropping it on the field in the center of their little group.

For a moment nothing happened, and then light streamed upwards out of the gadget. It was a thin blade of light at first, but then the light split and formed into something blocky. A house, Dick realized. One of the biggest ones Dick had ever seen, more like the size of a small castle.

Oracle cleared her throat, reminding him of both her and Diviner’s virtual presence, and said, “ _The Joker appears to be holding Jason Todd at an abandoned house over on the mainland, a couple of miles east of the Kane Memorial Bridge. The most recent activity at the house was about seven hours ago. I’ve been watching the place from our satellites and I saw three men carry what appears to be a large box into the house. My guess is it held Jack of Clubs._

“ _The bad news is that the Joker no doubt has safeguards in place in case we come for Jack of Clubs. Considering the massive amount of planning he has put into this little scheme of his, I think it’s safe to assume that he’s somehow monitoring the traffic on the Kane Bridge and in the R.R. tunnels over on the north side of the island as well, just in case one of us gets on his tail_.”

This all sounded awful, so Dick asked, “That’s the bad news, so is there good news?”

“ _The good news is that the Joker has spent a lot of time here, much more than he spent at the apple orchard or the warehouse where he was keeping Poison Ivy. I’ve already reviewed satellite imagery and have seen that there’s been an increase in the number of people moving in and out of the house for the past three weeks. They usually move at night, and the house is secluded, which is why they haven’t been seen before now. But the satellites don’t lie._ ”

“How is this good news?” Dick said.

“Base of operations,” Black Bat said, not uncrossing her arms from over her chest.

Batman nodded at her and turned to Dick and Selina, explaining, “Without Amusement Mile, he has to have some place from which he is orchestrating his attack. Meaning that if we can get in, we might not just find Jack of Clubs, but Rook too. Or at least more clues that might lead us to Rook.”

“And Harley,” Ivy said.

Batman nodded.

“ _The seven of you will be infiltrating the house. Nightshade, Poison Ivy and Batgirl will be entering on the ground level. Batgirl, you will be entering on the west side of the house_ ,” Oracle said, and one side of the house lit up for a moment, apparently showing Batgirl where she’d be going.

Then the hologram turned and zoomed in on what appeared to be an old greenhouse attached to the back of the mansion. Wild greenery was growing out of shattered windows.

“ _Nightshade and Ivy, this is where you will be entering. It’s all glass and too exposed, so it’s unlikely that Joker would be using it. It’s been abandoned for years, but there might be something that the two of you could use in there._ ”

Ivy cocked her head in a considering way as she inspected the hologram of the greenhouse.

“Nightshade will be staying in the greenhouse. We will need you to use your connection to the green to help Oracle figure out how many and where the Joker’s men are located in the house,” Batman said.

“I can do more than listen to the green,” Tim said.

“You almost died at Dr. Thompkins’ clinic,” Batgirl said. “It’s probably best if you lay low.”

Ivy turned sharply to look at Tim, but Tim just crossed his arms over his chest and said, world-weary, “I’m fine.”

“Accept your assignment or stay behind,” Batman said to Tim, and then turned to Ivy, moving on. “We do not have a communicator for you, so Oracle and Diviner will not be able to assist you in the house. Since the structure has been abandoned for some time, there are some places where plants and trees are growing inside. Your objective is to find these places and use them to our advantage, but you will avoid lethal force.”

Ivy frowned, but Oracle’s hologram was zooming out again, focusing on the roof this time, and she didn’t get the chance to argue.

“ _There are several places where the roof has caved in_ ,” Oracle said, and orange spots appeared over the green hologram of the roof. “ _Stray, Black Bat, and Catwoman will enter through these gaps in the roof and make their way down through the house. Catwoman, you will need to enter through the east wing. Stray can enter on the east side as well or the center of the house if he is able to do so unseen, and Black Bat will enter through a gap above the west wing_.”

“The goal is to get an idea of the layout of the mansion and infiltrate as far as possible before we are detected. We don’t want to reveal ourselves until it is absolutely necessary,” Batman said.

“What about Huntress and Falconer and the others?” Dick asked.

“What about them?” Batgirl asked.

Dick turned to her and said, “They’re not coming with us?”

“Batwoman and Batwing are staying with Dr. Thompkins to assist at the clinic. Huntress and Falconer have orders to continue watching Commissioner Gordon and his family. The seven of us will have to handle this,” Batman said.

“ _Diviner and I will be guiding you_ ,” Oracle said.

Dick looked around at the assembled group, not necessarily reassured. So few allies, to go up against a very prepared Joker.

But then again, he was fighting on Batman’s side—for the moment, at least. If anyone could handle the Joker, it was Batman. The silent Bat was no slouch either.

“Ok, let’s do it. It sounds fun,” Dick said.

“If Joker’s watching the bridge and the tunnels, then how are we going to get to the mainland without tipping him off?” Tim asked.

“We take the boat,” Black Bat said, as if it was obvious.

Tim and Dick turned stared at her for a moment.

“Right, the boat,” Dick said. “You Bats have all the cool toys. Well, what are we waiting for?”

* * *

**01:37:01**

Dick examined the mansion from the cover of the overgrown woods that surrounded the property.

It was a grand place, but decrepit and sagging in a way that was almost post-apocalyptic. Oracle hadn’t been joking about the huge holes in the roof, and many of the windows and doors were gone or broken as well. Dead vines were growing right out of—or into—these openings, and Dick couldn’t see any lights on inside. Even the snow in the lawn was smooth and white, unmarred by human footprints.

Reminding himself he wasn’t there to sightsee, he followed Black Bat and Selina, flipping up onto the nearby stone fence, running along the top of the crumbling wall to the house. Bless old houses, he thought as he scaled the stone exterior, using windowsills and decorative carvings as hand and footholds on the way up.

He didn’t see Black Bat or Selina when he got to the roof, and figured they’d already gotten into the house. He traveled carefully across the steep slats until he found the central hole Oracle mentioned.

There was an armoire down in the attic, close enough to the hole in the roof for him to get to. Dick jumped, not even bothering with his whip. He heard the sharp inhalation of breath through his communicator.

“ _Please don’t do that_ ,” Oracle said.

Dick had been reminded repeatedly on the boat that he wasn’t supposed to talk, so he didn’t say anything. Instead he slid off the top of the armoire looked around.

The attic was packed with old stuff, but it didn’t take him long to spot movement. He ducked behind an old mirror, but then he saw the pointed ears sticking up from the person’s head and relaxed. It was just Black Bat. She was standing over an odd lump on the floor.

It wasn’t until he got closer that he realized the odd lump was actually two bodies. Both were facedown on the attic floor, unwrapped bloody sheets spread around them. They were wearing jeans and dark jackets, but neither looked like Jason. The big guy had sandy brown hair, and the other smaller man had black hair.

Black Bat looked up at him as he approached. Dick mouthed, Who are they?

Black Bat lifted up her hands and made some kind of gesture at him.

“ _Joker’s men_ ,” Oracle said. Then Black Bat made a fast series of gestures that was too quick for Dick to keep up with, and Oracle said, “ _The ones who took Rook. We have them on camera._ ”

It took Dick longer than he was proud of to realize Black Bat was using sign language. She was signing at him and Oracle was translating.

“ _You should both keep moving. Batman can make sure the bodies are reported later_ ,” Oracle said.

Black Bat lifted her hand and made a “come on” gesture at him, and he didn’t need a translator for that. He nodded, stepping carefully around the pile of blood, and followed Black Bat out of the attic and down the steps to the third floor.

If not for the bodies in the attic, Dick would have continued to wonder if Oracle was right about this being the Joker’s base of operations. The third floor was cold, dark, and utterly abandoned. Creeping vines had started to make their way into the rooms with broken windows, and there was plenty of evidence of vermin—chewed plaster and animal droppings on the fraying rugs in the hallways. It wasn’t a place fit for anybody, even someone as soulless as the Joker.

As they made their way through the dark corridors, however, Dick began to see and hear the signs of Joker’s men. Laughter echoing up from dark stairwells. Beer bottles and cigarette butts tossed on the ground and left. Most of the doors were open, which was convenient, but they opened the ones that weren’t and found nothing except empty bedrooms and raided linen closets.

Abruptly, Black Bat turned to Dick and started making gestures at him again.

“ _No updates. Catwoman almost ran into a henchman, but she was able to sneak into a closet before he spotted her. B’s making his way through the west wing of the house. Nightshade and Ivy found the greenhouse, and Batgirl’s in what looks like a music room_ ,” Oracle said.

Black Bat nodded, hearing this too. Before she turned away, Dick pointed at himself and then pointed down another hallway, hoping his question was clear. Should they split up?

Black Bat nodded again. She pointed down the hall behind Dick and made another series of gestures.

“ _She says go that way and don’t get caught_ ,” Oracle said.

Dick raised an eyebrow and shot Black Bat an unamused look, and then he turned and headed down the hallway before she could try to impart any other unnecessary warnings.

A familiar sort of focus came over Dick as he made his way through the empty third floor.

Maybe he’d never infiltrated one of the Joker’s hideouts before, but there was nobody—save for Selina—who had more practice skulking around a mansion, trying to stay out of sight, than him. He thought about all of the penthouses and brownstones he’d robbed over the years, and how he’d never been caught, even in those cases where it turned out that the owners were home after all. It was saving Rook that finally got him caught, not this.

He was just about to turn down a hallway when the voices of henchmen came echoing from the opposite end. Dick looked around at the nearby doors, and slid into what turned out to be a bathroom before they saw him.

“—I don’t like being in the dark about what the hell is going on,” Dick heard one of them say as they approached.

“It’s the Joker, so get used to it,” said the other. “He never tells anybody his full plan.”

They were very close to Dick now. He could hear their footsteps getting closer and closer, and his heart raced with adrenaline.

“If you ask me, we should bail. We’re going to go up in flames like a fucking bonfire, and I don’t want to be caught over there when it happens.”

The second henchmen shushed him. When they spoke again, their voices were much softer.

“We’ve still got a while before the bomb goes off,” the second one said.

“Less than two hours,” the first one said.

“We don’t stick around until the job gets done, we don’t get paid. We run off early, we get shot. That’s how the Joker works.”

“Yeah, well that’s hilarious, because I never signed up to work for the Joker did I?”

“Don’t get pissy with me. Neither did I,” the first one said, but they were past Dick now. When one of them said something he didn’t catch, he poked his head out of the bathroom and saw that they’d turned another corner and disappeared. He could still hear their voices, but not what they were saying.

“Did you get that, Oracle?” Dick whispered.

“ _Affirmative. I have replayed the audio recording for Batman and Diviner and I are in the process of alerting the others now._ ”

“Where exactly in the house is your tracker saying Jason is?” Dick asked.

“ _Batman is handling it_ ,” she said. “ _Finding Jack of Clubs is important, but we need to know what else the Joker has planned. Investigating the rest of the house is necessary._ ”

Dick thought about it for a moment. Oracle had said that Batman was in the west wing, and he’d also told both Batgirl and Black Bat to enter the house through different parts of the west wing. And if the other side of the house was where Joker’s henchmen didn’t want to get caught…

Dick walked out of the bathroom and headed down the hall, traveling swiftly and quietly away from the two talkative henchmen.

Oracle realized what he was doing immediately. 

“ _Stray, you have orders_.”

Stray didn’t say anything, but he didn’t stop either. He had to focus if he was going to get through this house without being seen.

Again instinct and experience took over, even as the house became more cluttered and crowded. He slipped around piles of trash without making a sound and even tailed a henchmen down a hallway before the guy finally turned into a bedroom and shut the door.

“ _That was very risky_ ,” Oracle said.

The henchman had been too busy texting to notice that he was being followed, but Dick couldn’t say so, not with this many henchmen wandering around this part of the house.

Dick didn’t find anything worth noting on the third floor, so he headed down to the second floor and wandered through it as well, still sticking to the west wing. He didn’t run into any of the Bats either as he investigated. He was just about to abandon the second floor and head down to the first floor when he stumbled upon an old study. There were piles of canisters of chemicals and bits of scrap metal all over the floor.

Dick wandered in and picked up one of the metal containers, reading the label. Acetone.

Oracle made a triumphant sound and said, “ _This is where he’s been making his bombs_.”

Dick put the container of acetone down and was about to turn to leave the room, but Oracle stopped him.

“ _Wait! Let me get a closer look at whatever is in that cylinder by the desk_ ,” she said.

Dick went over to it and kneeled down so that she could see the label, since he didn’t want to actually pick it up.

“ _Troubling_ ,” she said.

Dick didn’t have any idea what was troubling, because the writing on the label was all in some other language. He thought maybe it was Vietnamese, but he wasn’t positive.

“ _Do you see those wires on your left_?” she said. “ _Can you get a closer look at those too_?”

This went on for a while, her wanting to see things and muttering things about blast radiuses and Joker gas. Dick followed her instructions and tried not to fidget, but he couldn’t help being a little antsy.

He had long since lost his patience when he finally whispered, “How is it that you know so much about bombs?”

Oracle shushed him and said, “ _You should probably move on._ ”

He straightened and left the room, grateful that Oracle couldn’t see him rolling his eyes.

Back out of the Joker’s lab at last, Dick found a stairwell—not the main stairwell, maybe this was a servant’s back way or something—and made his way down to the ground floor, realizing on the way down that he was grinding his teeth together. Where the hell was Jason?

As soon as he stepped off the last stair, Oracle said, “ _Two doors down, on the right_.”

Stray looked down the empty hallway, taking in the line of closed doors, and almost hesitated. She hadn’t wanted him to come to this part of the house, right? So why was she helping him now?

He went down the hall to the second one on the right and opened the door.

It was a child’s bedroom, and there was a person strapped to a chair in the very center. Batman was looming over him, but looked back when Dick walked into the room, and Dick saw a glimpse of the white symbol of the Jack of Clubs on the bound figure’s chest.

“Jason!” Dick said.

The person strapped to the chair looked up.

The room was too dark, so he hadn’t noticed at first. The hair was red, not black, and he had an overgrown red beard with little patches of grey in it.

It definitely wasn’t Jason. Whoever this was, Dick didn’t recognize him.

The bound man’s mouth was gagged. He spotted Dick first, and then looked up at Batman, his eyes wide. He tried to say something through the gag, but Dick couldn’t make sense of it.

“It’s not him,” Dick said.

Batman said, “We need to—”

There was a dull click, and then suddenly Batman threw himself at Stray. The air was knocked out of his lungs as he was tackled backwards out of the open doorway.

Then the room holding the bound man exploded into a maelstrom of heat, thunder, and light.

* * *

**00:52:44**

Damian was still meditating on the floor when the bomb went off somewhere in the house. He turned his head in that direction.

All of his babysitters did as well, which Damian thought was interesting. It was obvious they hadn’t been expecting it either.

Perplexed, Damian turned back to the cart and looked up at the TV.

On the screen, there was still the same video: the grainy black and white image of Jack of Clubs sitting in a chair in the middle of a child’s bedroom. His head was up this time, but he wasn’t moving. For a moment he was so still that Damian wondered if the picture had been paused.

Then Jack of Clubs looked incrementally to his right.

He was still alive.

“What was that?” Damian asked, turning to his captors.

Clown masks turned toward each other, but no one answered the question. Damian hadn’t really been expecting one.

* * *

Tim was inspecting a dead rosary pea plant in the greenhouse when he heard the explosion. He looked up sharply and then got to his feet so fast that it made him a little dizzy.

Jason, he thought, shaking his head to disperse the dizzy spell, and he made a beeline for the greenhouse door.

“ _Everyone freeze_!” Oracle yelled, and Tim halted. “ _Do not go toward that explosion. It was a decoy. It was not Jack of Clubs_.”

“What happened?” Tim asked, but there was no answer from Oracle or anybody else.

Then someone said, “ _Nightshade_?”

“Batgirl?” he said, recognizing her voice.

“ _I’m_ ”—she grunted—“ _in trouble! Where’s Poison Ivy_?”

“She’s somewhere in the house. What’s wrong?”

“ _Henchmen—they caught me in the ballroom. There’s too many of them_!”

Tim looked around at the greenhouse, at all of the leafless branches and vines spilling out of clay pots and hanging from the ceiling. Most of it was dead, long beyond saving, or useless until the spring.

But he could hear Batgirl’s grunts of pain through his comm. He couldn’t just ignore it.

“I don’t know how to get to the ballroom,” Tim said.

“ _I can lead you there_!” someone said, and it had been a while since Tim had heard him talk, so it took him a moment to remember that this voice was Diviner.

“Alright,” Tim said, and headed for the door, already calling to the green under his bare feet. Batgirl was protesting, telling him that he couldn’t, that he was still weak from the fight at the clinic. Tim ignored her.

It was time to bring the Joker’s house down.

* * *

It was an inferno, even under the protective cover of Batman’s cape. Dick felt like his suit was melting onto his skin and clawed madly at the material, too disoriented to realize what he was doing. Batman had to stop him, grabbing his hands so that he had to stop scratching at the suit.

Earlier than he would’ve liked, Batman was hauling him to his feet. Dick thought maybe he was yelling something at him, but all Dick could hear was the ringing in his ears. Batman finally had to pull him along, over the rubble and out of the burning hallway to safety.

The ringing in his ears started to resolve into voices. Yelling. Oracle was shouting through his comm.

“— _company soon and that side of the house is on fire, Batman! The flames are spreading_!”

“I hear you, Oracle,” Batman said.

There was shouting from down the ruined hallway. Dick realized that he was basically letting Batman carry him and put his feet down on the ground, forced his muscles to work, willed his body to move through the pain. If Batman could go through an explosion and get up and walk, then so would he.

Eventually Batman realized that he was holding himself up.

“I’m fine,” Dick said. “I can walk.”

“Are you hurt?” Batman said.

“No, thanks to you,” he said. “But where’s Jason? Where are the others? Are they ok?”

Batman didn’t answer the question, but Oracle said, “ _The others are fine. They were far enough away from your location to not get caught in the blast. Whoever that man was in the chair, though, he wasn’t so lucky._ ”

Dick followed Batman until the smoke finally drove them out of the hallway and into a huge front entryway. A grand staircase led up from the tiled entrance to a second floor landing, and there was a gigantic crystal chandelier hanging from the tall ceiling overhead.

There were also men waiting for them. They were wearing clown masks and they were holding a variety of weapons—baseball bats, rifles, knives, crowbars. They were standing guard in front of the bottom of the stairs and the front door, and Batman stepped in front of Dick, making himself a human shield.

“Batman!” said a delighted voice.

Dick and Batman both looked up again, and suddenly Joker was there too, standing at the top of the stairs.

He looked just the way Dick remembered—purple suit, wild green hair, and that manic smile, distorting his face into something that looked plastic, almost inhuman. There was a henchman standing just a couple of steps behind the Joker. He was very tall and thin, and Dick couldn’t see his face because of his orange and green clown mask, but he was wearing a subdued black pinstripe suit and holding a tray with a teacup and saucer on it.

“Joker,” Batman said, and he didn’t sound scared, or even particularly surprised. Maybe this should’ve made Dick feel better, but just looking at the Joker made his skin crawl.

“Hello, old friend!” the Joker said, cackling. “I have so looked forward to being reunited at long last.”

This announcement was met with silence. Batman was unmoving as a statue.

“You didn’t have to break into my humble abode. I like to prepare for my guests,” the Joker said.

The Joker turned and yanked the henchman in the pinstripe suit forward, and the teacup slid off his tray and hit the landing, shattering on tile. The Joker threw his arm around the henchman’s shoulder, pieces of teacup cracking under their feet.

“If I’d known you were coming, I would’ve had Jeeves here clean up some of my messes first!” the Joker said, and laughed.

Batman shifted somehow, seeming to suddenly grow taller. When he spoke again, his voice as a menacing rumble.

“Where is Rook?” Batman asked.

The Joker pushed the henchman away and waved a hand at Batman, saying, “He’s fine, I swear! I didn’t harm a feather.”

Dick stepped out from behind Batman.

“What have you done with Jason?” Dick asked.

The Joker looked over at Dick, and there was an expression of almost blank surprise on his face, as if he hadn’t realized that Dick was there. The moment lingered on, but the Joker didn’t answer the question. Finally he looked back to Batman, ignoring Dick altogether.

“I’m sorry about stealing your little blackbird, but I have to be honest, Batsy, it was painful to watch,” the Joker said.

He stepped away from the stairs, heading down the banister along the second floor landing until his body was almost blocked from sight by an enormous crystal chandelier.

“I hate it when I notice potential being squandered, you see,” the Joker went on. “Your son has such a bright future ahead of him, but your boring old rules are keeping him from achieving greatness. Honestly, what would his mother say?”

Dick glanced up at Batman’s face, but couldn’t tell what was going through the Dark Knight’s head.

“So I brought him here! Thought it would remind him of home. And I gave him a little proposition. Just to see what he would do. He’s disappointed me so far, but I think there’s still hope for him.”

“Whatever it is that you’re planning, it won’t work,” Batman said.

“We’ll see about that, Batman,” the Joker said.

Batman moved suddenly, making a break for the stairs towards Joker, so fast that Dick almost missed it. The henchmen in clown masks almost missed it too, one of them going unceremoniously down as Batman basically plowed through him.

But the swing of a mallet stopped Batman at the foot of the stairs, the newcomer giggled, holding her weapon high above her head.

“Hey Bats,” Harley said. “You staying for supper?”

“Harley!” Dick said. “What are you doing?”

Harley’s eyes glanced in Dick’s direction, but her expression didn’t change. She just kept grinning, and then she looked back up at Batman, still holding her weapon high over her head. Her eyes were sparkling, delighted, like she truly was overjoyed to see them.

“Harley, he has Jason!” Dick said.

“Harley?” the Joker said.

“Yeah, Puddin’?” she said, turning to look up at him.

“Why don’t you give Batman a tour of the house?”

Harley laughed and said, “It would be my pleasure.”

That was when all hell broke loose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soooo...sorry about the delay T_T I ended up having to send my laptop in for repairs, and it disrupted my usual writing schedule. Also just in case you didn’t notice, there’s a surprise two more chapters instead of one more. Chapter 21 got way too long so I split it up.
> 
> The good news is that I finished Sons of Sirens on Saturday night, so I am just working on making the final couple of chapters all shiny and perfect before they’re posted. Thanks as always to Rainicorn2015 and NobodyisHome for helping me edit this beast and thank you for reading Sons of Sirens!


	22. Chapter Twenty-Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harley’s laughter echoed through the entryway, haunting and louder than the yells of the henchmen.

**00:48:07**

Dick dodged one henchman with a crowbar and another one trying to brain him with a rusty metal pipe.

Harley’s laughter echoed through the entryway, haunting and louder than the yells of the henchmen. Her almost frenetic swings of the mallet kept Batman from moving up the stairs, and even though he easily dodged the blows, he seemed reluctant to engage in the fight. Dick was simultaneously glad for that and confused by it.

The Joker, on the other hand, was long gone. He’d vanished as soon as Harley made her appearance.

Dick flipped over the head of Rusty Pipe, snapping his whip to grab the pipe. He tugged it back sharply as soon as he hit the ground, making the man bash himself in the face.

The henchman with the crowbar was undeterred, and Dick ducked when he charged, slipping under the sharp bent end of the crowbar to knee the guy in the groin. The crowbar tumbled right out of his hand and the man slipped to the ground, letting out a high agonized wail.

“ _Stray, your left! Gunman at your left!”_

He could get used to Diviner in his ear. Dick rolled out of the way just as the gunman fired, and he shot one of his fellow henchmen instead, right in the stomach. Dick felt a moment of guilt about that as he snapped his whip at the shooter’s face. His red, orange and pink mask cracked in half with a satisfying snap, and then the man was screaming, losing the gun as he grabbed for his bloody face. Dick saw enough to know that the man’s right eye was a goner.

“ _Stray!_ ” Oracle yelled.

“He had it coming,” Dick said, unrepentant, and Oracle huffed but didn’t say anything else.

For a brief moment the space around Dick settled and stilled, and Dick took the reprieve to look around the chaotic entryway. Henchmen were still streaming in through doorways and down the stairs, distracting Batman from his fight with the bigger threat, Harley Quinn.

And he, meanwhile, was more or less being ignored unless he went out of his way to pick a fight with one of the henchmen. It was kind of insulting.

While Batman was giving it his all, Dick knew he couldn’t hold them off forever. They were swarming—they were going to bury him in a pile of bodies and weapons.

“Shit,” Dick muttered.

Before he could think better of it, he jumped on top of an old round table, sending the vase on top of it crashing toward the floor. Then he jumped again, flipping in the air over the crowd of henchmen and landing behind Batman, inserting himself right in the middle of the fray.

“What are you doing?” Batman yelled.

“What does it look like?” Dick asked, as he slashed his whip at a henchman attempting to knife Batman in the side. “I’m helping!”

“Not your smartest move, kitty!” Harley said, swinging her mallet at Dick.

Dick lunged out of the way, almost knocking into Batman’s back.

“Harley, what are you doing? How could you do this to Jason?” he said.

A strange expression flickered over Harley’s face, so fast that Dick couldn’t decipher it.

“You’ve got it all wrong, sugar,” she said, and raised her mallet again. “I’m doing this _for_ Jason.”

* * *

**00:43:18**

Damian didn’t budge from his reflective stance on the floor, but he caught the uneasy looks Joker’s babysitter’s were shooting at each other and at the parlor’s doorway in his peripheral vision. Something else was happening in the house, and whatever it was, the clowns-for-hire weren’t in the know. Damian could sense their anxiety.

Damian’s eyes flickered to the TV screen, checking on Jack of Clubs again. He was still sitting in the chair in the child’s bedroom, his head slumped forward over his chest this time. Either he was in fact drugged, or he was somewhere where he couldn’t hear the same commotion that Damian could hear.

One of the henchmen leaned over and whispered something to another. His voice was too low for Damian to catch it, especially over all of the noise coming from downstairs, but he focused on them anyway, hoping to pick up even a little bit of what they were saying.

Then there came a loud crash from down the hall, and all of the men jerked to attention, weapons all pointed at the door, not at him.

“What was that?” one of them asked.

Damian checked the TV screen again, but again Jack of Clubs hadn’t moved. Taking advantage of their distraction, he glanced behind him, and spotted the pile of glass that had been a lamp before Joker threw his pipe at it. There were several large intact shards just about four feet from him. Damian immediately turned back around before anyone could catch him looking. He was pleased to find that no one was focusing on him still.

Amatuers.

Damian allowed himself a small smile as he shifted his stance, preparing to move. He kept smiling, even as the henchmen turned their attention back to him.

“What are you grinning about?” one of them snapped. His clown mask was plainer than the others, with small red lips, tiny black eyes and eyebrows, and red dots on the cheeks and nose. It was almost cherubic in its simplicity.

Damian looked up at him and said nothing, just kept smiling.

“Joker said to keep you alive. He didn’t say anything about slapping you around a bit,” the same clown said.

“That is not a wise idea,” Damian said.

“Oh yeah?” the henchman said, jerking the barrel of his gun at Damian in a way he probably thought was threatening. “What do you call this backtalk? A wise idea?”

“I do not know what the Joker told you about me—"

“He told us you’re the son of Batman. That accurate?” another one asked. This one’s mask had large green eyes and a gaping orange mouth full of too-long teeth. The head was bald, and there were tufts of yellow hair above his ears.

“Your pops is the reason my wife is behind bars, you know that? Twenty-five years,” the cherub said.

“If it is any consolation, I think my father is here now, so I am sure you will be joining your wife behind bars soon,” Damian told him.

The cherub clown took a step forward, saying, “You little—”

Then there was another crash in the hallway, and the henchmen’s attention shifted from him again. It was only for a second, but that was enough. He moved before they’d recovered to the pile of glass, picking up several shards as he stood up in one smooth motion. Lunging up over the back of the sofa, he tossed one of the larger shards and it connected with its target, embedding itself in the meaty part of the cherub clown’s upper thigh.

He howled and the other men shouted in alarm, but before they could fire their weapons, Damian was coming up behind the clown nearest to him and jumping on his back, clinging to him as he pressed the glass shard into his neck.

“Don’t shoot,” Damian told the others.

It was a gamble—if these henchmen didn’t care at all about each other, they were likely to shoot the man down just to get to Damian.

But it was better than sitting around waiting to die, so it was a gamble he was willing to take. Damian tightened his grip on the clown’s neck and pressed the shard a little deeper into his neck. Damian felt him flinch with the pain. His father was going to be upset if he ended up killing this man...

“Drop your weapon and kick it toward the center of the room,” Damian whispered into his ear.

The man dropped his rifle and kicked it like Damian told him to. It clattered across the floor out of reach.

“You’re making a mistake, kid,” the bald clown said.

“It is all of you who have made a grave miscalculation. You should run now before it is too late,” Damian told them.

The men hesitated, and Damian held his breath, waiting to see what they would choose.

Then there was a loud crack, so sudden that even Damian flinched. He looked toward the sound and saw a thick coil of black ropes suddenly tied around the cherubic clown’s neck. With a strangled grunt, the man was yanked back into a shadowed corner of the parlor.

“Who’s there?” the bald clown yelled, but the whip was cracked again and the man went down, dropping his weapon as he screamed and clutched his ear. “My ear, my ear—!”

Damian didn’t let the opportunity go to waste. He dropped the shard of glass and dropped the man he was clinging to with a nerve strike, and had moved on to the next man before he had even hit the ground.

“No, stop!” the bald clown said and tried to aim his gun, but Damian was too close too fast. Before the man could do anything, Damian struck him in the shin, the groin, and then grabbed his arm, twisting him around to shove him into the fireplace. The man collapsed on the old pile of charred firewood in the hearth and didn’t stir again.

Catwoman came into the light then, taking out the fourth clown while Damian fought the fifth and final one. Clown number four went down when Catwoman kicked him in the head with one of her heeled combat boots, and then number five backed away from Damian and made a beeline for the door. Damian took a step after him, but Catwoman stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

“Let him run,” she said, and then she gave him a quick once over and asked, “Are you alright?”

Damian didn’t respond for a moment, unsure how he felt about Catwoman expressing concern for him. He’d never particularly made an effort to disguise his disdain for her.

Finally, however, Damian nodded her and said, “I am unharmed.”

“Good,” Catwoman said.

 She reached up and pulled her goggles off. She fiddled with the strap for a moment, then handed them to him, saying, “Put these on.”

Damian stared at the goggles for a moment. They looked like Stray’s. He swallowed, uncomfortable all at once, possibly even more so than he had previously with clowns pointing guns at him.

“Why?” he said.

“We need to protect your identity,” Catwoman said. “For your dad.”

For his father. Damian pushed past the unease and slipped the goggles over his head.

She tightened the strap a little more, then patted him on the shoulder and said, “Come on.”

As she pulled him up, she turned and her eyes landed on the TV screen. She stopped and gazed at it for a moment, no doubt recognizing the figure on the screen at once.

“The Joker tried to convince me to kill him,” Damian told her.

Catwoman turned sharply to face him and said, “What? How?”

Damian pointed at the detonator, which was now on the floor, and said, “He wanted me to choose between his life and my own. He said it didn’t matter, because the room where he is keeping Jack of Clubs is rigged to explode either way.”

Catwoman frowned. She touched the communicator in her ear and said, “Oracle, tell Batman I found Rook. Also, there’s something else.”

* * *

**00:36:00**

_We have to run_ , Tim thought.

He and Batgirl were back to back in the center of the crumbling ballroom, surrounded on all sides by henchmen. The green was telling him that the house was burning, and he was too conscious of the many layers of wood, stone, and plaster above them. He wanted to bring the place down, but he would prefer to not be trapped in it when that inevitably happened.

Tim saw something hurtling toward him and ducked out of the way before it could hit him in the face. It was a candlestick, but when Tim ducked it bashed into Batgirl’s back instead. She grunted in pain, stumbling, and the blast from her gauntlet that had been meant for one of the henchmen hit the marble floor instead.

“Ow!” she said.

“Sorry!” Tim said.

“Can’t you—I don’t know—use that kudzu plant again?” Batgirl said, firing again at the same man. This time she hit him and he went down, crying out in pain.

“I don’t have any with me,” Tim said. All he had was some of the Boston ivy that grew all over the mansion, and most of his energy was directed toward keeping the stuff alive long enough to fight with it.

Batgirl threw a shuriken at a henchman with a shotgun. The shuriken hit his hand, and the man fumbled the gun, almost dropping it. Batgirl shot him with something in her gauntlets before he could recover and he passed out.

Tim had been distracted watching her fight, and barely managed to dart out of the way before another henchman swiped at him with a serrated knife. Tim urged the ivy to grow around the man’s arms, but it was too slow and Tim shuddered, feeling echoes of the green’s pain as the goon sliced through the ivy.

Batgirl said, “This is not ideal. We need—”

Batgirl didn’t get to finish her sentence. Across the ballroom, there was a shout of alarm and Tim heard a quick series of punches. The crowd of henchmen was suddenly surging out of the way of something.

A dark figure emerged from the sea of brightly-colored clown masks, flipping in the air and landing gracefully by Tim and Batgirl.

“Black Bat!” Batgirl yelled.

“Hello,” Black Bat said, smiling and waving at them before she turned and knocked out the henchman with the knife with a single sharp punch to the jaw.

“Strategy?” Black Bat asked as she kicked a henchman’s feet out from under him and came up to take out another with a sharp jab of her elbow to his back.

“I haven’t—been able to think of one,” Batgirl said between grunts.

Tim looked up and around the room, sparing as much attention as he could while they were all still fighting. There were some large, heavy-looking chandeliers hanging over their heads. Doorways at the back of the ballroom led out to the gardens behind the mansion, but these exits were currently blocked by crowds of henchmen. The doors leading back into the rest of the house were similarly blocked by Joker’s men. The only weapons they had were the Boston ivy, Batgirl’s gadgets, and Black Bat and Batgirl’s fists.

And while they were all distracted fighting henchmen, Jason was still trapped in the house somewhere.

Tim shook the thought off, frustrated. They needed somebody else other than Black Bat. They needed—

He felt Ivy’s approach before he heard her or saw her. One of the walls burst open in a shower of splintering wood and plaster, and a mass of Boston ivy, much bigger than anything Tim had been able to coax into life, spread into the room. It tangled up henchmen and pulled them shouting off their feet.

Relief surged through him as Ivy stepped out of the center of the mass, beautiful and unruffled. Some of the henchmen took one look at her and split, and the rest fell back, wary now that Gotham’s original plant meta had arrived.

Before he could do or say anything, Tim felt something coursing through him, like a rush of adrenaline. It was her power—Ivy’s power. He hadn’t known she could share it with him.

Tim tapped the green with his mind, sensing it pulsing around him more strongly than ever before. Was this what she could feel all the time? In an instant, he could see and hear everything that was happening in all of the places in the old mansion where the green had grown in and taken over. Some of the Boston ivy clinging to the west side of the house was burning, and Batman and Dick were fighting with Harley in the entryway. Selina was upstairs, running down a long hallway with a smaller figure in tow. He was wearing her goggles.

Tim kept looking, but he didn’t see him.

As Ivy approached, Tim said, “He’s not here. Jason. I can’t find him.”

“Harley is working with the Joker,” Ivy said grimly.

“I know. The green is showing me that too.”

The remaining henchmen were circling them again, ready to resume the fight.

Tim knew what Ivy wanted to do without her having to say it. He glanced back at Black Bat and Batgirl over his shoulder as the floor started to tremble and said, “Try not to get in the way.”

The rumbling was the only warning as he and Ivy brought the green up through the floor. Marble was smashed to pieces as roots broke through, lunging and snapping at henchmen like the many tentacles of some mythical beast. For the first time that Tim could remember, the power didn’t feel like a drain, and he found himself grinning as he and Ivy trapped the Joker’s men in their growing mass of ivy and roots.

* * *

**00:28:56**

The longer the fight went on, the more obvious it became: if Batman was reluctant to hit Harley Quinn, that was nothing compared to how obviously Harley didn’t want to hit Dick.

He came at her with his whip, hoping to disarm rather than injure her. She swung her mallet in retaliation and it landed on the marble floor about a foot away, not even coming close to hitting him.

“Harley, if you have any idea where Jason is, you need to tell me now!” Dick said.

“You’re meddling in things you don’t have any business meddling in, kitten,” Harley told him, laughing. “You should run back home to your litter box before it’s too late!”

Dick felt a rush of rage at this and snapped his whip at her, with feeling this time. The very end of it hit her cheek and Harley shouted out in shock, pressing her hand to the thin bloody mark.

For the first time since the fight had began, she wasn’t smiling. Her voice was whiny and pitiful when she asked, “Hey, what’s that for?”

“Jason is running out of time!” Dick yelled at her.

That odd look crossed Harley’s face again, and this time it settled long enough that he could see it for what it was. Fear.

And yet Harley just picked up her mallet and laughed again, swinging it like a baseball bat at Batman this time instead of at Dick. Batman, of course, dodged the swing and shoved Harley back. She lost her footing and toppled over backwards onto her back with a shout.

The reprieve was short lived as henchmen in a variety of clown masks came at them, ignoring Dick until Dick almost took one of them out with a crack of his whip.

Dick was coming up under Batman’s left arm, taking out a henchman by jamming his elbow into the man’s masked face, when Oracle spoke.

“ _Batman, Catwoman found Rook!_ ” she said.

If he hadn’t been halfway draped across Batman from that last move, Dick would have missed how Batman’s breath caught for a second.

Batman released the breath and said, “Tell her to take Rook out of the house to safety now. I will contact her when we have found Jack of Clubs and returned to the city.”

“ _There’s something else,_ ” Oracle said. “ _Rook said that the Joker tried to convince him to kill Jack of Clubs. He gave Rook a detonator, but he said that the room where Jack of Clubs is being held is rigged to explode whether or not the detonator is pressed._ ”

Dick and Batman exchanged a glance before Batman had to dodge out of the way of what looked like one of the rails from the sagging stairway.

Dick turned back to face Harley, who was getting to her feet and brushing dust off her suit.

“Whatever it is that the Joker told you, he was lying,” Dick told her. “He never intended to let Jason live.”

Harley frowned, an expression of doubt crossing her face.

“Puddin’ promised—”

“I don’t care what he promised!” Dick yelled. “He was lying. If you don’t help us, Jason will die!”

Dick watched her think about it, frowning pensively.

The moment dragged on, and Dick took advantage of how the henchmen were ignoring him, letting Batman deal with them instead.

Finally, an expression of resolve crossed over Harley’s face. She didn’t smile, and Dick watched her lift the mallet again.

* * *

**00:21:33**

Harper was just about to throw one of her taser shurikens when she could suddenly hear Cullen in her ear saying, “ _Batgirl_?”

“What is it, Diviner?” she asked, and shot the henchman. He slumped to the ground, still shaking, only to get pulled away by a thick root, still shuddering.

“ _I think I found something_?” Cullen said.

“What is it?” Harper asked, distracted as she turned to Ivy, who was about to bite one of the clowns with some giant mutant flower with heavy red seeds hanging out of a maw of a bulb. “Ivy, no lethal tactics!”

It was probably the seventeenth time she’d reminded her. Both she and Nightshade hardly spared Harper a glance, but they didn’t kill the henchman, just pulled him into the growing wall of greenery. Harper counted that as a win.

“ _Oracle told me to see what I could find out about the house where you’re fighting and I found blueprints for something else_ ,” Cullen said.

“What do you mean, something else?” Harper asked.

“ _There’s some kind of guest house that was part of the original property_ ,” Cullen said. “ _It’s behind the garden, about a half mile from the big house, and from what I’ve read, it was abandoned long before the rest of the property was._ ”

“Ok,” Harper said, not understanding what her brother was getting at.

“ _I checked the satellite images and the Joker’s men have been in there. The last time they were in there was this morning,_ ” Cullen added.

Nightshade was helping Ivy, but he hadn’t missed the fact that Harper was distracted. He frowned over at her, saying, “What is it? What’s happening?”

“Diviner thinks he found something,” Harper said, and glanced over at Cass, who pitched a guy over the shuddering wall of ivy and then turned to gaze thoughtfully at her.

“What is it?” Cass asked.

“Another house,” Harper said. “A guest house about a half mile from here. He thinks the Joker might be using it.”

Ivy and Nightshade exchanged a glance, then looked at the ballroom, decimated by their plantlife.

“Go,” Ivy said. “See what’s there. Tim and I can hold the men off here.”

Harper looked at the growing green wall again, then at Black Bat. Cass nodded.

“Alright,” Harper said, and she and Cass turned at once and slipped out of the ballroom through a broken window before any of the henchmen could stop them.

* * *

**00:10:43**

Catwoman had him by the sleeve of his sweater and was pulling him through the forest. Damian couldn’t stop shivering.

“Your assistance is unnecessary,” he said, yanking his arm out of her grasp. “I am weak, not useless.”

He was proven wrong a second later when he tripped over a tree root hidden beneath the cover of snow and almost landed face first on the ground. Selina stopped his fall by grabbing his arm with a firm grip, the sharp nails of her suit pressing into his skin.

“You sure?” she said, raising an eyebrow.

Damian didn’t dignify the dig with a response, instead halting to look around at the overgrown wilderness surrounding them. The orange tint of Catwoman’s goggles gave everything a warm glow.

“I believe we may be lost,” he said.

“We need to keep moving,” Catwoman said.

“We should go back and fight with my father,” Damian said.

“All he wants right now is to know you’re safe,” Catwoman said. “I’m going to—”

There was a deafening crack and Catwoman shouted out as she fell forward, tumbling into the snow. Damian wasn’t fast enough to catch her.

“There you are!” someone said.

Damian turned and saw the Joker standing between two trees, holding Damian’s katana in one hand, and pointing a still smoking gun at Damian with the other.

“You!” Damian said.

“Me again,” the Joker said, laughing.

Damian stepped in front of her without thinking.

“Playing the little hero now, I see,” the Joker said, laughing again. The pant legs of his purple suit were wet up to his knees, the snow having long since soaked through. He must’ve been tracking them since they left the house.

Damian stood his ground.

“You’re losing,” Damian told him. “Give up.”

“I’m the one with the weapons, if you hadn’t noticed. But you know, you still have a chance to join the winning team,” the Joker taunted. “No matter what disguise you where, I know what you are. Carrion, my little feathered friend.”

Damian was about to snap back at him, but then he heard a soft groan behind him.

He turned and saw Catwoman roll over, one leather-clad hand pressed to her bleeding shoulder. She didn’t say anything, just glared over at the Joker.

“Oh no, the kitty cat isn’t dead?” the Joker said. “We can’t have that. Time for the final act.”

* * *

**00:02:34**

Jason stared at the clown doll’s eyes, lost in its blank glaze. He’d lost track of how long he’d been in his old bedroom, and a poem was coming back to him. Jason couldn’t remember all of it, or even where he’d read it originally or if he even had the lines right.

“ _Take me disappearing through the smoke rings of my mind, down the foggy ruins of time. Far past the frozen leaves, the haunted frightened trees. Out to the windy beach far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow,_ ” he said.

The clown doll just kept staring at him. The ticking noise went on, steady as a metronome, drawing the words out of Jason with a sort of rhythm.

“ _Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free, silhouetted by the sea,”_ he said, as if it was a spell, and saying it the whole thing might set him free. _“Circled by the circus sands, with all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves. Let me forget about today until tomorrow._ ”

A tune came into his head then, and he muttered the rest of it.

“ _Hey, Mr. Tambourine man, play a song for me. I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to._ ”

It came back to him then, the memory. His mother singing the song off key under her breath as they rode the bus down to the public library. It was mid-summer, and Jason had been bored out of his mind. The song had been playing on the radio that morning as she poured Jason a bowl of cereal.

The longer he thought about it, the more the day came back. He’d been little, on that day, maybe seven or eight. Catherine Todd had brought him over to the kid’s area and wandered off. Jason settled into a chair read a book, and it was only when the librarian finally asked him where his parent was that he found out she’d left him there.

It was weird that it would come back to him so clearly now, just as he was being forgotten again. Right before he was about to die.

Jason shook his head, trying to knock the memory loose. He thought about Harley instead—Harley who loved pop music and dancing and had never left him at a public library. Harley who walked into a bookstore and stole an entire series for him just because he said he wanted to read it. Harley who had looked Joker in the eye and told him that if she ever saw him again she’d shoot him in the face.

Jason closed his eyes and leaned back in the chair, a strange sort of serenity settling over him.

It hadn’t been all bad, his life. At least he had Harley for a little while.

Then, out in the hallway, there were footsteps. He opened his eyes and looked up at the door, hoping it wasn’t the Joker coming to taunt him again. That was the very last thing he wanted.

The door was kicked open a second later, and Jason looked up into the masked faces of...Batgirls. The ones in the blue and the black suits.

Jason’s heart leapt up into his throat. He never thought he’d be happy to see a Bat symbol, but it looked like he was wrong.

“Jack of Clubs!” the blue one yelled. “We need to get you out of here now!”

Jason jerked his head at the clown doll and said, “It’s in there! I think the bomb is in there!”

Instead of throwing the damn thing out of the room—which is what he would have done—the quiet one in the black suit went around her companion and stepped into the room, heading straight for him. She pulled something out of the belt around her waist and cracked it against the chains binding his wrists together. In an instant, the chains were blisteringly cold.

“Batgirl, help,” she said, and the one with the helmet came around and fired something at the chains with her gauntlet. The metal shattered, slipping off his hands and clattering to the ground.

He tried to get to his feet, but his legs were weak, and he stumbled, almost collapsing on the bed right on top of the clown doll. Closer to the damn thing, he could definitely hear that the ticking was louder. He was right—it was the bomb.

Without a word of warning, both Batgirls slid around him. He let them slip under his arms and pick him up, slowly helping him hobble out of the room. Across the hallway from the child’s bedroom where the Joker had left him was another empty room, this one with a window that looked out into the grey sky.

“Can’t you two go any faster?” he snapped. He was suddenly very anxious about dying, now that rescue had arrived.

“You’re not exactly light!” Batgirl grunted.

When they made it to the hall, Jason turned to head down a narrow stairwell.

“No time,” Black Bat said, and she pulled them in the direction of the open window. She was already outside and helping Jason through when he heard it.

The ticking stopped.

“Fuck,” Jason said.

Something slammed into him just as the clown doll exploded, pushing him off out of the window. He was falling, he realized, and Black Bat and Batgirl were falling too. None of them screamed as they hurtled down to the bright snow below.

* * *

Damian flinched when he heard the explosion go off in the distance, but the Joker giggled, softly at first, until he was finally laughing hysterically.

“Poor Jester,” the Joker said, between gasps of breath.

Damian eyed the new plume of smoke already rising above the treeline, and then looked back to the Joker. The madman was distracted, but it was as if he could sense Damian’s thoughts. The moment Damian took a step forward, the Joker lifted the gun again and pointed it at Damian’s chest.

“I don’t think so!” he said.

Damian glared at him and stopped.

“You disappoint me, fledgling,” the Joker said. “You wouldn’t kill Jester for me. I blame your catty friend, for getting you out of it.”

“I never intended to kill Jack of Clubs,” Damian told him.

“Oh, posh!” the Joker said, waving the gun at Damian. “You’re still pretending you’ve changed! That you’ve reformed! When you and I both know better.”

He tossed the katana on the snow in front of Damian.

Damian stared at it, then back up at Joker’s face, not understanding what was happening.

“Face facts, birdy boy. There’s no way out of this without making some hard choices.”

“What are you talking about?” Damian asked him.

“Kill the cat, and I’ll forgive you for not hitting the old button on Jester,” the Joker said. “Refuse, and, well—I don’t have to say it, do I? What’s it going to be?”

Damian turned and glanced down at Catwoman. She was still clutching her wound, and watching Damian with wary eyes. It cut, that distrust. No one trusted him.

The worst part was that he knew he didn’t deserve it. Even as he protested, even as he insisted out loud that he wouldn’t kill, he could hear his grandfather’s voice whispering in his ear.

_No help is coming for you. You did not kill Jack of Clubs, and you see the result. He died anyway. Why protect this woman’s life? It is meaningless to you._

He knew that she was not Stray’s real mother, but their features were similar enough that they could be mistaken for relatives. Black hair. Wide eyes, hers green instead of blue.

_Appease the Joker, and find a way to get rid of him later. Why make the same mistake twice?_ that same voice whispered.

Damian turned and picked up the katana.

The Joker watched him, grinning.

“You’re right,” Damian told him. “The only way out of this is by making hard choices.”

He stepped in front of Catwoman again, blocking the Joker from being able to shoot her again.

The Joker tutted.

“Well,” he said, shrugging. “No one can say I didn’t try.”

He lifted the gun. Damian lifted the katana.

Then someone yelled, “Selina!”

Damian and the Joker turned, and saw Stray, Batman, and Harley Quinn approaching from down a snowy slope.

“You!” Harley Quinn yelled. “You lied to me!”

“No, no!” the Joker said.

The Joker turned and pointed the gun back at Damian’s head. He wasn’t smiling and laughing anymore. He looked furious, angry and unhinged as a rabid animal.

Several people yelled at once, but all Damian could see was the barrel of the gun pointed right at his face, and the way the Joker’s face slowly lit up, morphing from fury back to joy. That grin was going to be the last thing Damian would ever see.

Then something huge and dark slammed into him. Damian felt like he was swallowed up in darkness as he heard the gun fire, and the shot was immediately followed by a sickening crack.

The huge black shape that had hit him was his father. Batman had thrown himself over him, protecting him from the Joker’s gun.

“Father!’ Damian said.

Batman groaned and released him, and Damian saw blood streaming down his neck.

“You were shot!” Damian said.

“Just grazed,” Father said. “My ear. I’m fine.”

Damian grabbed him around his chest and held on, breathing in Batman’s scent of gunpowder, gasoline, and smoke. It was a smell as familiar to him as the cologne Bruce Wayne wore. Then those strong arms wrapped around Damian, holding him so tight it almost hurt.

Several moments passed in his father’s embrace before Damian realized that there was activity happening around him.

Stray had come around Damian and his father to help Selina Kyle staunch the flow of blood from her shoulder. He was pressing something to her skin, and she was murmuring to him soothingly, insisting the wound wasn’t deep.

Damian turned his head to look over his father’s shoulder and saw the Joker in a twisted heap on the ground. For a moment he didn’t understand what he was seeing. The back of the Joker’s head was caved in, and Harley Quinn’s bloody mallet was lying next to his arm.

Harley Quinn collapsed next to the Joker’s body in the snow. Tears streamed down her face, white makeup dripping off her chin onto her suit.

“You promised me!” she said, hugging her knees to her chest and rocking back and forth in the snow. “You promised! You said you wouldn’t hurt him if I did what you asked me to do. Little Jay is gone and it’s your fault!”

The wailing went on for some time. Damian watched from the safety of his father’s side. Stray and Catwoman watched as well, both of them silent.

At long last, Batman let go of Damian and got up. He went around to Harley Quinn and crouched down next to her.

“Dr. Quinn,” he said, and set a hand on her shoulder.

Harley looked up at him, hiccuping through sobs.

Batman pointed at something behind her.

Damian, Catwoman, and Stray looked with Harley Quinn in the direction where his father was pointing.

Damian didn’t see anything at first, but then he noticed them. Three people were coming toward them through the trees. As they got closer, Damian realized who they were.

It was Batgirl, Black Bat, and Jack of Clubs. The three of them were soaked and covered in ash. Black Bat and Batgirl were helping Jack of Clubs walk, and Batgirl was holding her arm gingerly like it might be broken, but they were alive.

Harley Quinn gasped and said, “Jay!”

She got to her feet and ran. Batgirl and Black Bat let go of Jack of Clubs right before Harley Quinn smacked into him, jumping right into his arms and sending them both tipping toward the snowy ground.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter to go!


	23. Chapter Twenty-Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stephanie spent most of Christmas Day in bed watching Netflix on her phone.

**Three Days Later, on Christmas Day**

Stephanie spent most of Christmas Day in bed watching Netflix on her phone. Lonnie left around 3 in the afternoon to go protest capitalism or something, and she wasn’t expecting him to be back until late. So when she heard someone coming in through the front door at half past 6, she was alert in an instant, already shutting off her phone screen and gingerly pushing herself up in spite of her broken collarbone.

Her bedroom door was pushed open seconds later, revealing Cass in the dark hallway. She was wearing a forest green sweater and black pants, and there was a matching green headband in her dark hair.

“God,” Stephanie said. She lowered herself slowly back down on the bed, somehow annoyed _and_ relieved. “You could’ve knocked.”

“You’re injured. Didn’t want to make you get up,” Cass said.

Cass crossed most of the tiny room with two steps. She stopped to stand over Steph on the bed, and then she cocked her head.

“How did you leave the cave?” Cass asked.

“I stole a sling and a bunch of morphine and called an Uber while Alfred was busy with Carrie,” Stephanie told her.

“Should have stayed. Alfred was worried.”

Stephanie groaned and said, “Come on, Cass. Don’t guilt trip me with sad Alfred.”

Cass shook her head. “That’s not why I am here.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Bruce and Damian came with me. Want to talk to you,” Cass said.

A cold feeling came over Stephanie, as if she’d been doused in ice water.

“No,” Stephanie said, and shook her head once before a sharp jab of pain reminded her that was a bad idea. It was one thing to see Cass—Cass had always accepted her in a way Bruce didn’t—but she didn’t have the patience or energy or desire to see Bruce. The very thought made her skin crawl. Again, a bit more vehemently this time, she said, “No.”

“They don’t want to...fight. Have something for you. For Christmas.”

“I don’t have anything for them, and I don’t have anything to say to them either,” Stephanie said.

“Hear them out? For me?” Cass asked, turning those huge innocent eyes on her. “My gift, from you.”

Stephanie rolled her eyes and breathed deep, careful not to disturb her collarbone again. Cass just watched her, patient and silent.

Stephanie was too injured and drained to battle Alfred guilt _and_ Cass guilt. After a long pause, she heaved out a sigh and said, “Fine. But they have five minutes, and then they have to go and swear not to come back here again.”

Cass nodded.

Stephanie’s mouth twitched and she gestured at herself with her good arm, saying, “Can you—you know—help me?”

As always, Cass understood exactly what Stephanie wanted. She helped Stephanie sit up so that her back was propped up against the headboard, and only then did she leave the room. For a moment Stephanie could hear soft murmuring outside in the hall, and then the door was being pushed open again. This time it was Damian and Bruce who walked in.

They were dressed in warm jackets and winter boots. Bruce had a knit hat pulled over his head and Damian had a thick red scarf wrapped around his neck. They were both holding presents. Bruce’s was a small box covered in lavender paper and tied with a dark purple bow. Damian’s looked like a wooden box, glossy and stained dark.

Stephanie was in pain, but she wasn’t in so much pain that she missed the way Damian was looking around the tiny bedroom, at the piles of stuff crammed under the desk and piled on top of the dresser. It wasn’t like she didn’t _know_ it was a shithole. It wasn’t even her shithole, but remembering that just made her feel worse.

Bruce was looking right at her however, and met Stephanie’s flat stare without flinching. He looked calm and healthy, his skin red from the cold, but otherwise unruffled. Stephanie wouldn’t have expected anything else.

“How are you feeling?” Bruce asked.

“Like I have a broken collarbone,” Stephanie said.

Damian finally stopped looking around at the room and focused on her instead. Or at least around her, eyes flickering over her in the bed. He didn’t seem to be able to meet her gaze.

“Well?” Stephanie said. “What do you want?”

Bruce looked down at Damian, and Damian took a hesitant step forward.

“This is for you. Pennyworth assisted me in selecting it,” Damian said.

He held out the wooden box, and Stephanie accepted it after a pause. Looking at him, she still felt a twinge of anger, but it was blunted, as if what had happened between them had happened a lot longer ago than a few days.

Damian’s eyes glanced up at his father for a second, and then returned to Stephanie again. Relieved of his gift now, he clasped his hands behind his back as if he didn’t know what to do with them. It struck her suddenly that he was a terribly awkward little kid. Just a little boy trying so hard to crush every childish impulse. She didn’t know why she hadn’t noticed it sooner.

“You’re alright,” Stephanie said to him.

Damian’s eyes flickered up to meet hers and he nodded hesitantly.

Bruce glanced down at his son, and, in a much warmer tone than he’d used the last time she saw them with each other, he asked, “May I have a moment alone with Stephanie, please?”

Damian glanced between them and shrugged. He glanced back at Stephanie, meeting her eyes again for the barest instant and said, “Merry Christmas, Brown.” Then he turned and left the room, shutting the door after himself.

When they were alone, Bruce walked over to the bed and held out his gift, the small box with the purple ribbon.

“This is for you. I think you should open it now so I can explain,” he said.

Stephanie was surprised by how light it was. Bruce didn’t let go as she pulled on the ribbon with her uninjured arm, and kept holding on as she ripped the paper off. Then he opened the box for her and she reached in, feeling around for whatever was inside. The only thing she found was something small and cold. She pulled it out and studied it.

It was a copper key.

Bruce spoke before she could say anything.

“I am aware of the fact that you were essentially homeless before moving back into the Manor eight months ago. I understand if you do not desire to return to your old room there, but I cannot say that I am comfortable with the idea of you having to sleep on Anarky’s couch.”

“I’m not on the couch,” Stephanie pointed out.

Bruce went on as if she hadn’t spoken.

“The apartment that this key belongs to is in Old Gotham. It is far away from Wayne Manor, but nearby the Diamond District to make patrolling convenient. It is private, and quiet, and secluded. All rent and utilities will be covered, and you have my word that no one will visit you there unless you request it.”

She was horrified to feel tears prickling in her eyes, and she had to clench them shut so that the tears couldn’t slip free.

“I don’t need or want your charity,” she spat, opening her eyes again and glaring at the key.

“It isn’t charity, Stephanie. No matter what happens, you are family. And if it makes you feel any better, the gift isn’t from me. This was all Alfred’s idea. He’s the one paying the rent.”

“And _you_ pay him.”

“If you don’t want it, you can give the key back to him,” Bruce said. “Just...think about it first. Go look at the place and see how you feel. You can’t stay here forever.”

Stephanie made a fist, gripping the key between her fingers until the cold metal was warmed by her palm.

Bruce shifted, and the floorboards creaked under his feet. She didn’t want him to stay, but neither could she muster the energy to tell him to go.

“Stephanie,” he said.

Stephanie finally opened her eyes and looked up at him.

“I...there is something I have been meaning to tell you,” he said.

His voice was different all of the sudden, darker and deeper. This was Batman.

“You...attempted to…”

He trailed off and cleared his throat, and Stephanie could feel a familiar trickle of panic spreading through her. It was rarely good when she had Batman’s undivided attention. It usually meant she’d fucked up.

“You attempted to help me at a time when my emotions were compromised, and I believe I owe you an apology,” he finally said.

An odd tingling was spreading down from the hand gripping the key, numbness trickling through her limbs.

“I did not treat you as I should have while you were Batgirl,” he finally said. “I...made many missteps with you. And I am sorry.”

The numbness hit Stephanie’s chest, and for a moment, she couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t even feel the aching of her broken collarbone anymore.

Then the feeling cracked, and sensation rushed back in, pain and warmth and weariness. She felt sting of tears all over again, and only her power of will held them in.

The silence stretched on, awkward and painful with all of the things that had been left unsaid.

Maybe it was the painkillers, but somehow Stephanie found herself speaking.

“I was always a disappointment. Sometimes it was like...I could never do anything right. So after a point I just, stopped telling you.”

Bruce’s frown deepened and he said, “Stopped telling me what?”

“Anything,” she said. “I didn’t want to tell you anything. It was better if I just...kept it to myself. And then after that night…”

She trailed off, unable to make her mouth form the words. It was unnecessary anyway; they both knew which night she was talking about.

She found herself babbling.

“I didn’t want to have to see that look of disappointment when you realized I’d screwed everything up again. I broke your most important rule. I killed him because I wasn’t good enough to get out of the fight some other way. And then I ran because I was too much of a chickenshit to look you in the eye and tell you to your face. I thought you were going to turn me in and I didn’t know which was worse, facing your anger or going to prison. And I know all you don’t see me as someone worth trusting with anything—”

“Stephanie,” Bruce said.

Suddenly he was so close, sitting down on the edge of the bed. He put his hand on her good shoulder and the words dried up in her mouth.

“That night you told me you needed me to be there to help you fight Cluemaster and I didn’t listen. I should have. I am the one who should shoulder the blame for what happened. I am sorry that I was not where you needed me to be, or even who you needed me to be. You are not, and have never been a disappointment to me.”

She tried to look away, but he took her face in his hands gently, forcing her to make eye contact. “Stephanie, no matter what happens, you will always be family.”

Stephanie didn’t know what to say to that. She stared up at him, searching his gaze for the catch, for the disappointment and disgust, but all she saw was steady acceptance. Something warm trailed down her face and she realized she was crying. She no longer cared about holding the tears back.

Bruce cleared his throat again. He bolted upright suddenly and Stephanie watched him as his attention darted around the tiny room, turning his back. It was almost like he didn’t want her to see his face. Was Batman...emotional? Or were the painkillers making her hallucinate?

After a moment, Bruce, all businesslike again, said, “Merry Christmas, Stephanie. Text Alfred if you would like to visit the apartment, and he will send you the address.”

He turned and walked out of the room without waiting for her to say anything else.  

Stephanie stared after him, looking at the empty door frame through blurred vision. She wasn’t quite sure she believed that what had just happened wasn’t a figment of her imagination.

There was a murmur of voices outside in the den, and then Stephanie heard footsteps, and the unmistakable sound of the front door opening and shutting.

Stephanie took a deep breath, wiped her eyes, and set the key down in her lap before reaching for the box from Damian. It was lighter than she was expecting, and there was no ribbon or wrapping as on Bruce’s gift. She hit a catch to open the box and the lid lifted. A tinkling tune played from the box, like a jewelry box. Stephanie thought it might be one of the Franz Liszt pieces Alfred liked.

There was something small and soft inside the tinkling box. She pulled it out and found that it was a little bat plush, small enough to fit in the palm of her hand, with floppy wings. Its fur was purple, and there was a tag hanging from one of its feet. The tag said _For Stephanie_ in a delicate swooping script, and there was a small drawing of her, Spoiler mask and hood on.

Tears were sliding out of her eyes again when she heard her door creak. She looked up and saw Cass.

“Ok?” Cass said, walking over to her bed and sitting where Bruce had so recently vacated.

“You’re still here,” Stephanie said.

“Yes,” Cass said, smiling. “Always.”

“I forgot that I didn’t thank you. For saving me from Deathstroke,” Stephanie said.

Cass shrugged. “No thank you is...necessary. I saved you for me as much as I saved you for you.”

Stephanie blushed and she couldn’t help the laugh that burst out of her, even if it did hurt like hell.

“Want to watch Queer Eye with me on my phone?” Stephanie asked her.

Cass’s eyes lit up and she said, “Of course.”

Stephanie scooted over as much as she could in the lumpy twin bed as Cass took off her boots. Then Cass climbed under the blankets and snuggled up against Stephanie’s uninjured shoulder, and she was warm and soft and smelled of cinnamon and home.

* * *

Although it was Harley’s favorite holiday, she spent most of Christmas Day laying despondent on the floor in the apartment’s tiny living room. She was next to her makeshift Christmas tree made from painted Amazon cardboard boxes, and surrounded by torn wrapping paper, brightly-colored ribbons, and gifts she’d purchased for herself on the internet. She’d been out of sorts since the...incident.

The fifth time Jason walked by and saw that she hadn’t moved at all, he finally ventured into the den.

“Where’s Ivy and Tim?” he asked.

Harley didn’t react. Her eyes were open, but she kept staring into space. For a minute he thought she wasn’t going to answer the question.

At last, she sniffled and said, “Pammy and Timmy went somewhere to do plant stuff. She’s mad at me.”

Harley’s face crumpled and in an instant she was sobbing into the ratty carpet.

“She’s not mad at you,” Jason said over the noise.

Harley valiantly spoke through her sobs.

“She— _hic!_ —doesn’t believe— _hic!_ —me! She thinks I really— _hic!_ —left her for Mister Jay!”

“She just wants some time with Tim. And she wanted to give us some time too,” Jason told her. “We were going to make Christmas cookies, remember?”

“I love her, not him!” Harley wailed.

“I know,” Jason said. He sat down on the ground and patted one of her hands. “We all know. He’s gone. He’s gone because of you.”

Harley heaved out a shaky breath and said, “Yeah.”

She lay there for a moment longer in silence, and Jason watched her as he contemplated the novelty of being alive. He thought he was going to die, but now it was the Joker who was dead—again. Only this time it had happened right in front of Jason, and he had seen the body with his own eyes. He wasn’t pissed that it was Harley who had done it. If it had to be anyone other than him, Harley was the only acceptable alternative.

Jason was about to ask Harley if she wanted to watch Elf again when there was a sharp knock at the door.

Harley immediately sat up, makeup smudged and hair sticking up on one side of her head, but no longer hysterical.

“Who could that be?” she said, cocking her head at him.

“I don’t know,” Jason said, frowning. “Does anybody know we live here?”

“Maybe Pammy told Selina?” Harley said, shrugging. Then her face lit up and she said, “Or it’s my Sephora order!”

“I don’t think they’re doing deliveries on Christmas Day,” Jason said, and he got to his feet.

He fetched his club from the umbrella stand next to the door and gestured sharply at Harley to get out of sight. Pouting, she crawled behind an ottoman.

When she was hidden, Jason turned back to the door and looked out the peephole.

There was a man standing on the other side of the door. He was wearing sunglasses and a dark blue baseball cap. He was pretty tall and thin, and he had a small dark mustache. Jason didn’t see any weapons and the guy didn’t look dangerous, so he leaned his club up against the wall—within reach but out of sight—and opened the door.

“Can I help you?” Jason asked him.

“Would you be Jason Todd?” the man said.

He had a posh British accent, and he was wearing a suit. _Metropolis_ was embroidered on the baseball hat in a swirling silver script.

“Depends,” Jason said, hackles rising. “Who’s asking?”

“It is very nice to meet you, sir,” the man said, not answering Jason’s question. “I came today as a representative of my family, whose members would like to offer you a gift.”

Jason narrowed his eyes at the old man.

“You don’t work for Roman Sionis, do you?” Jason asked.

“Good heavens, no.”

He sounded so aghast that Jason almost expected him to cross himself.

“I am afraid I am not at liberty to divulge who sent me,”  the man went on, as he pulled an envelope and a photograph out of an interior pocket in his suit jacket.

He held up the picture and said, “Do you recognize this woman?”

Jason took it from him and got a closer look at the photo. He felt a jolt when he recognized that distinctive scarred face. It was his redhead, the one who he found in the alley.

“Oh,” Jason said. “Her.”

She was wearing grey leggings and a bright red sweater that clashed with her hair. She wasn’t quite smiling, but she was looking right at the camera at least.

“We have been missing her for quite some time, and we are so relieved to have her home.”

Jason narrowed his eyes at the old guy and asked, “She didn’t run away from your family, did she?”

“No,” the man said, a frown tugging at his lips. “Rest assured that she is cherished and cared for, Mr. Todd.”

The British guy held up the envelope and said, “This is for you.”

Jason took it and opened it under the man’s watchful gaze. There was a fat stack of paper inside, and Jason pulled the sheets out and began rifling through them.

It took him a moment to figure out what he was looking at, and even then he wasn’t quite sure he believed it.

“What is all this?” he said.

“Her father was able to secure a spot for you in the literature program. There are also identification documents and cards, and the scholarship details. It should be enough to cover your lodgings as well as tuition,” the British man said, waving his hand at the stacks of paper.

“I don’t understand,” Jason said, shaking his head.

“My employer is quite aware of who you are, Mr. Todd, and the fact that you can no longer attend classes here in Gotham as Seth Richardson. Think of this as an opportunity to continue your studies.”

“Yeah, and that sounds real nice and all, but this university is in Europe,” Jason said. It was easier to imagine himself on the moon, and the whole thing made him feel oddly furious and sick at the same time.

“I am aware of that. We thought it might be in your best interests to be...not here for the near future,” the man said, nodding. “Regardless, this is a gift, and therefore yours to accept or reject. Our family simply wished to express our gratitude.”

Jason looked down at the stack of papers again. He didn’t know what to say.

“Merry Christmas, Mr. Todd, from my family to yours,” he said.

Without another word, the man turned and left, and Jason was still too stunned to say anything. He watched the guy head down the hall to the elevator and get on to go downstairs.

Jason shut the door, and Harley immediately crawled out from behind her ottoman, asking, “Who the heck was that?”

Jason didn’t answer, instead going over to the window in the kitchen that looked down onto the street. He waited and watched until the old guy came out of the building and climbed into a taxi. He was still wearing the hat and sunglasses. The taxi pulled away from the curb and the man was gone.

Jason went to the kitchen table and started going through all of the papers again. It felt like he was watching himself in a play, reading about what an alternate universe version of himself was doing.

“Who was that guy?” Harley said as she sat down across from him, snapping him out of his reverie.

“No idea,” Jason said, but he handed her the acceptance letter from the university.

Harley looked down at the letter and read, “Vincent Kirkpatrick. Who is that?”

Jason snorted and handed her the ID card. She inspected it, finally putting two and two together and said, “Oh. That’s you. He wants you to get the hell out of Dodge.”

“Kind of taking it to the extreme, but yes,” Jason said.

“Well with the way Black Mask has been gunning for you,” Harley trailed off, frowning for a moment. “You’re gonna do it, right?”

“Harley, come on,” Jason said, and gestured sharply at the apartment. “I can’t go to fucking Europe. You and Ivy and Tim are here. The Joker nearly just killed us all. We can handle a mid-level mobster. I can’t leave now.”

Harley gestured at the acceptance letter and said, “You wouldn’t be leaving tonight. This says you’d have a couple of weeks before the next term begins.”

“Did you not hear the part about how the school is in Europe?”

“So we’ll come visit,” she said, as if it was simple. Then her face lit up and she said, “I’ve always wanted to go on a European river tour!”

“Harley!” he said, and groaned, rubbing his eyes.  But Harley talking like this was a possibility made the whole idea seem so much more real.  

“Oh Jay,” she said, covering his hand holding the papers with both of her own. “We’ll always be family. Even if you’re far away. Distance will never change that.”

He could feel that almost foreign feeling of hope curl in his chest again. He could go to school again. Hell, he would be living in the same city Jane Austen had lived in, and if that wasn’t a dream come true...Jason looked down at the new ID again and sighed.

“They couldn’t have picked a name less douchey than Vincent Kirkpatrick?” he asked.

Harley laughed and said, “I think it suits you!"

* * *

Tim enjoyed Ivy’s company. Sometimes being around Harley and Jason got overwhelming. But Ivy, when she was focused, could go hours without saying a word. Tim liked that they could work together in her lab in companionable silence.

He urged the plant on the ground to grow and it did, much faster than he was expecting. In a matter of seconds the roiling mass of it was as big as a golden retriever, and he eased off the green, coaxing it to slow down.

When it did, he stepped away from the plant and stared at it, puzzled. It could’ve been an effect of Ivy’s lab, which was as hot and damp as a sauna. Normally the green didn’t react to him that fast.

“Your powers are getting stronger,” Ivy said.

Tim flinched and turned to see that she was standing right behind him.

Ivy frowned at the plant and cocked her head, asking, “ _Abrus precatorius_?”

Tim nodded and said, “Yeah. I found a seed in the Joker’s greenhouse.”

“Rosary pea plants are a highly invasive species.”

Tim shrugged and sat down next to it, digging around in the leaves for the little clusters of red seeds.

“I know. I wasn’t going to let it get out. I just wanted to see what the seeds tasted like.”

“You know I don’t like it when you do that,” Ivy said, putting her hands on her hips.

“It can’t kill me.”

“We’re pretty sure it won’t kill you, but that’s not the same thing as knowing it won’t. I don’t approve of you using your own body for science experiments. Just because something is poisonous to normal humans doesn’t mean you need to try it.”

Tim muttered “Killjoy” under his breath, and Ivy clucked her tongue.

She didn’t leave, though. He kept working with the rosary pea plant and she kept watching him. He had no idea what was going through her mind, or what he could have done to attract so much attention.

Finally, her scrutiny became too much to bear. He looked back up at her and said, “What?”

Her eyes flickered over him and she said, “Your suit. You’re wearing the one I made you.”

Tim glanced down at the embroidered leaves around his knees.

“Oh, yeah. Dick told me that Batman put trackers in those suits he gave us, so I left mine somewhere for safekeeping.”

“Are you going to wear it again?”

Tim considered the question and said, “I don’t know. Maybe.”

He turned back to the rosary pea plant, giving it a little boost of encouragement to grow some white flowers under the sun lamp. Just like before, it was easier than he was expecting it to be, and he was conscious all the while that Ivy hadn’t gone back to her own work yet.

“You and Batgirl seemed to get along pretty well,” she said.

Tim turned and glanced up at her, perplexed, but Ivy was just gazing down, steadily observing him as she might one of her experiments.

“I guess so,” he said.

“Do you like her?”

Tim raised his eyebrows and said, “You mean, _like her_ , like her? I haven’t even seen her face.”

“So?”

Tim could feel that he was blushing, and had to look away, focusing on the rosary pea plant instead. Batgirl was pretty cool, but it wasn’t her that kept popping up into his head at random times. He thought again about the suit from Batman, and the open offer to join Young Justice. That suit made certain things...easier.

“No, I don’t like her. She’s nice, but not like that,” Tim finally said.

Ivy didn’t say anything for a moment, and then he heard the soft sounds of her bare feet walking across the concrete.

She was gone for so long that Tim forgot about the conversation altogether. He had plenty of red seeds now, and was still thinking about ingesting them, no matter what Ivy said.

Then Ivy was back, clearing her throat. Tim turned and looked up at her, and saw that she was holding a leather-bound notebook.

“I have something for you,” she said.

She handed him the notebook, and Tim took it. While she watched, he opened it and started to flip through the pages. It looked like an experiment, one that would result in a liquid.

“What is this?” he asked.

“What do you think it is?” she asked.

Tim studied the pages some more, squinting down at them.

“It looks like...the vaccine. The one you gave to Harley and Jason,” he said.

Ivy nodded.

“I had to update it after you found me. The details for that formula are closer to the back. It’s the one you would want to use if you were going to make the vaccine so that people can touch you.”

Tim couldn’t stop flipping through the pages. He wished he had an eidetic memory so he could preserve it forever in his mind. Somehow he had this irrational fear that Ivy would think better of it and snatch the book away. She couldn’t just be handing this to him, right? Why would she do that?

“I don’t understand. If I give this vaccine to someone, they’ll be immune to you too,” he said.

“I know,” Ivy said, and crossed her arms over her stomach again.

“But...why are you giving this to me?” he asked.

She gave him a stern look, but didn’t explain. Finally, she turned away and headed back into her corner of the lab, saying over her shoulder, “Choose wisely, Tim. Don’t give that vaccine to just anybody.”

* * *

**New Year’s Eve**

“I do not understand why school is necessary,” Damian told his father as they landed on top of the corporate offices of Gotham National Bank.

“You will go to school, or you will give up Rook,” his father said, in a tone that betrayed no mercy.

“But I will be bored out of my mind!” Damian protested.

Father didn’t say anything, and Damian could already tell that there was no way out of this argument.

For a while Damian glared down at the streets far below. Gotham was quiet that night, its citizens all adjusting again to the reality that the Joker was dead. There was a body this time, although the body was scheduled to be cremated in a little under twelve hours.

“You will be cutting back on your patrol hours,” Father said.

Damian’s head snapped in his father’s direction, and he said, “Why?”

“Because you will have schoolwork. I am not going to forbid you from being Rook, but you will maintain a balance.”

Damian glared at his father, assessing him the way he would assess any opponent. His father was staring straight ahead, stern and immovable as the gargoyle he was crouching next to. Was this punishment?

“I do not understand,” Damian said.

“What’s to understand?”

“Am I being punished for something? Who will you patrol with you if not me? You have spoken before of how much you rely on your partners in the field.”

“It isn’t a punishment, and I have other partners. Notably Black Bat and Spoiler, if she decides to work with us again,” Batman said.

“What if it’s an emergency?” Damian asked. “If you are in danger and need help, you cannot expect me to stay behind and do nothing.”

“Black Bat and I will evaluate what support we need as those cases come up. Unless specifically given the ok, I expect you to follow orders,” Batman said.

Damian made a face, but before he could continue the argument Batman went on.

“Batgirl will be cutting back as well. Her injuries need time to heal, and she has spoken to me about how she intends to join Young Justice. I am not going to continue monopolizing time that she could be spending with her brother,” Batman said. Then he glanced over at Damian and said, “It isn’t a punishment. I want both of you to have some semblance of a normal childhood.”

Damian rolled his eyes, glad his father couldn’t see it with his domino mask on. He wanted to say that he had never had a normal childhood, but he knew this would only annoy his father, so he didn’t say it.

“Also, we’re having lunch with Superman and Superboy next week,” Batman said.

“What? Why?” Damian protested.

“Because he’s a nice kid. You’ll like him, I promise.”

Damian _really_ wanted to complain now, but he held his tongue. His father was looking at and speaking to him, and he was Rook again. Damian didn’t want to do anything to mess that up.

So he would go to school. He would stay at home and do homework on weeknights. He would go to this lunch with the Kents.

He sneered just thinking about it, but he didn’t complain.

Deep down, he wasn’t as annoyed about it as he perhaps would have been several weeks before.

“Why are we here?” Damian asked, changing the subject. “Should we not patrol in the Bowery as usual?”

“Huntress and Falconer are on call. They’ll go if there’s trouble,” Batman said.

That didn’t really answer Damian’s question, but it turned out he didn’t have to wait long for one. They’d only been standing on the roof of Gotham National Bank for a few more minutes when his father suddenly pulled out his grappling gun and pulled the trigger.

He watched as his father swung toward the ground, landing on the pavement across the street from Gotham National Bank.

Perplexed, Damian pulled out his own grappling gun and followed.

It wasn’t until he got to the sidewalk that he noticed the two people coming down the alleyway. A man and a woman, both with light brown skin and black hair. The man was younger than the woman, and he was wearing glasses and a knit hat.

With a jolt, Damian realized it was Catwoman and Stray. 

“Hello Bat,” Selina Kyle said, smiling. “Happy New Year.”

“You should be at home resting,” Father told her.

“You’re sweet to worry, but my shoulder isn’t hurt that badly. Besides, Dick and I never miss Christmas Carol in the Park. It’s tradition,” Selina said.

“And how many pockets did you pick?” Father asked.

Selina Kyle and Richard Grayson both smiled, and Selina said, “You think we were picking pockets on a holiday? Even I’m not that much of a Scrooge.”

Batman grunted in a way that expressed his disbelief. He turned to Dick Grayson, saying, “You should get new traditions. Life will be different for you now that your identity has been compromised.”

“I know, that’s why I got these,” Dick said, and pointed the glasses on his face. “They were Selina’s idea. Don’t you like them?”

“I think the disguise is flimsy,” Damian said.

Richard Grayson turned his head to look down at Damian.

“Don’t worry about me,” Grayson said. “I always figure out a way to turn things around.”

“You do seem to have a preternatural ability to wriggle out of things unscathed,” Damian told him.

“Was that a compliment? Because it sort of sounded like one.”

Damian frowned and said, “I suppose I can deign to acknowledge that you’re not entirely without skill.”

Richard Grayson threw his head back and laughed. Damian started, surprised and offended at once.

But when Grayson stopped laughing, he smiled down at Damian and said, “You know what, I think that underneath all that bluster and prickliness, you’re probably an ok kid.”

Damian felt warmed by the comment, and was annoyed with himself for being so easily swayed by meager crumbs of flattery. Still, somehow he did not suspect that Dick Grayson was being insincere.

A different thought struck Damian then. The man had nearly risked his life saving Damian from certain death. Yet he was smiling and relaxed, looking down at Damian as if had no expectations for this coincidental meeting. Damian could walk away from the situation and it would make no difference. And yet.

_An apology is not for you. Never apologize just for you_ , he thought, Cassandra’s words coming back to him clearly enough as if she was standing right next to him.

“I apologize that my actions resulted in your identity being exposed,” Damian said.

It was Richard Grayson’s turn to look surprised. The smile was wiped off his face, and for a second he only gazed down at Damian. Perhaps there were other things Damian could add, but he did not elaborate on his apology.

Finally, Grayson smiled again and said, “It was bound to happen eventually. No hard feelings.”

Grayson pulled a hand out of the pocket of his jacket and held it out for Damian to shake.

Damian stared at the hand suspiciously for a moment before he reached out his own hand and shook it. Then Richard Grayson let go and Damian took an immediate two steps back.

“I’m not going to turn you in tonight,” Batman said, looking back to Catwoman. “But you should go home and stay out of trouble. If not I might have to change my mind about taking you both to the G.C.P.D.”

Selina Kyle stepped over to Batman and smirked up at him, saying, “You know a girl like me loves a night on the town. I’m not really the staying home type.”

She leaned in as if for a kiss. Unbelievably, his father leaned in to meet it. But just before their lips met, Selina pulled away and went back to her son’s side, linking her arm through his. Arm in arm, the two of them stepped around Damian and his father as if Rook and Batman didn’t scare them in the slightest.

“Maybe I’ll see you around soon, Batman,” Selina Kyle said, eyeing Damian’s father over her shoulder.

Father said nothing, merely turned to watch her go.

“Until next time, Batman, Rook,” Dick Grayson said, waving at them.

The two of them went away together, laughing and chatting as they made their way down the snowy sidewalk.

When they were gone, Damian said, “She stole one of your shurikens.”

His father frowned and checked the pouches of his utility belt.

“Hmm,” Father said. “Go home, Rook.”

Damian put his hands on his hips and demanded, “What for?”

“I should go get my shuriken back from Catwoman,” Batman said, and pulled out his grappling gun. “I’ll tell Alfred to expect you.”

His father pulled the trigger and lifted into the air, his cape whooshing in the cold wind. Damian rolled his eyes and as he watched his father go.

“ _We’re playing Clue back here at the Manor_ ,” Oracle said.

Damian flinched. He hadn’t realized she’d been listening tonight.

“Clue is a juvenile game,” he told her when he’d recovered.

“ _Have you ever played it_?”

Damian didn’t answer the question.

“ _That’s what I thought. Alfred made snickerdoodles too. You’d better hurry before Cullen and Carrie eat them all_.”

It was cold, and Damian had no important cases to work on. He supposed he could stand sitting through a round of a childish game if it meant he could have some of Pennyworth’s baked goods.

“I will return in thirty minutes. Tell Pennyworth to set aside a cookie for me.”

Oracle snorted and said, “ _I’ll relay the message. See you soon, kid._ ”

Damian got out his grappling gun and pulled the trigger, swinging home over the dark streets of Gotham.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My beta reader Rainicorn2015 is begging me for a series of one-shots in this universe so we'll see if that happens. 
> 
> If you are also reading my other story, Qualified, the good news is that I finally wrote chapter 7 and will be posting it soonish.
> 
> Thanks for reading Sons of Sirens!

**Author's Note:**

> New chapters will be posted on Mondays.


End file.
